Associate Professor Charles Bailey

Associate Professor Charles (Chuck) Bailey leads the Centre of Rare Diseases & Gene Therapy at Centenary Institute. His mission is to translate research discoveries into curative gene therapies for rare diseases. His research career at Centenary Institute has spanned 25 years, studying human genetic diseases and the molecular pathogenesis of cancers. A/Prof Bailey received a BSc (Hons) UNSW in 1996, and PhD in Biotechnology (CRC for Biopharmaceutical Research), UNSW in 2001. He teaches, supervises students and contributes to research governance within the School of Medical Sciences, University of Sydney.

As Group Leader, Cancer & Gene Regulation Laboratory at Centenary, his lab focuses on normal and aberrant gene regulation in genetic disease, cancer and normal biology. A/Prof Bailey is an expert in all aspects of molecular and cellular biology, viral vector production, AAV biology RNA and protein biology, CRISPR, transcriptomics, proteomics, flow cytometry, confocal microscopy and animal models of disease.

He has published 60 research articles which have been cited 5,500 times (inc. Nat. Genet., Cell x2, J. Clin. Inv. x2); >2,500 times since 2020. He has supervised 4 PhD, 4 MPhil and 15 Honours students to completion. He received a NSW OHMR grant (CIB, 2018-21) which led to the discovery of a new AAV receptor (Cell, 2025). A/Prof Bailey is CIA on two NHMRC Ideas Grants (2025-7, $1.067M; 2026-9, $1.944M) for safe and accessible AAV gene therapies. He co-founded & leads AAVec Bio Pty Ltd, which received a CUREator grant (2023-6) for targeted AAV vectors for muscle-directed gene therapy, leading to IP (PCT/AU2024/051111). He was a CI on CCNSW Project Grants (2020-23) examining: i) novel gene regulatory mechanisms in cancer; & ii) circulating tumour cells in pancreatic cancer. A/Prof Bailey is Chair of the RPAH Institutional Biosafety Committee, serves on the University of Sydney Animal Ethics Committee (3 yrs), and Tour de Cure Grants Committee (10 yrs). He convenes a Consumer Review Panel consisting of three cancer survivors/carers which reviews his lab’s research.