Ruedi Aebersold is a Swiss/Canadian scientist trained at the Biocenter, University of Basel, Switzerland. After postdoctoral research at Caltech, he was on the faculties of the University of British Columbia, Vancouver and the University of Washington, Seattle WA. In 2000 he co-founded, with Lee Hood and Alan Aderem, the Institute for Systems Biology in Seattle. In 2004 he joined ETH Zürich to establish the Institute of Molecular Systems Biology. He has co-founded several companies and holds multiple public service appointments. The group’s work was recognized with numerous national and international awards including the Biemann medal of ASMS, the Paracelsus prize of the Swiss Chemical Society, the Otto Naegeli Prize, the Thomson medal of IMSF, the HUPO achievement award, the Marcel Benoist Swiss Science Prize, the most prestigious science award in Switzerland, and the Heineken award for Biochemistry and Biophysics in 2024.

The research focus of the Aebersold group was the proteome. The group pioneered several widely used techniques and generated open access/open-source software and statistical tools that contribute to making proteomic research results more transparent, reproducible and accurate and, when applied, advanced the understanding of molecular processes in basic biology and clinical research.

Ruedi Aebersold entered emeritus status in 2021 and now serves as a member of the board of trustees of several foundations that support life science research.