Professor Benjamin Kile is Head of the Department of Anatomy and Developmental Biology, Monash University, in Melbourne, Australia. An NHMRC Principal Research Fellow, Ben trained at the Walter and Eliza Hall Institute (WEHI), where he obtained his PhD in 2001. After postdoctoral studies with Professor Monica Justice at Baylor College of Medicine in the USA, he returned to WEHI in 2004, establishing an independent research group in 2008. The Kile lab moved to Monash in 2017. The lab is focused on the molecular regulation of blood cell formation and function, with a particular interest in the role of cell death pathways in hematopoietic development and survival. Recent work has centred on the mitochondria as a source of innate immune signals during apoptosis.