Dr Thom Dixon is a member of the ARC Centre of Excellence in Synthetic Biology (CoESB) and the Executive Manager, Research Ecosystem at the University of Technology Sydney. Previously he was the Manager, National Security and Defence at Macquarie University.

From 2017-2024, Thom was the Vice President of the Australian Institute of International Affairs NSW. He is an alumni of the 2017 EU-Australia Leadership Forum and the 2021 US-Australia Next-Generation Leadership Initiative. In 2022, he was sponsored by the United Nations to present to the Science and Technology Preparatory Meeting in India ahead of the 9th Review of the Biological Weapons Convention. He received the Vice-Chancellor's Commendation for Postgraduate Research, the 2023 Higher Degree Research Excellence in Humanities, Arts and Social Sciences from Macquarie University, and a 2023 Outreach Excellence Award from the CoESB. In 2024, he was seconded part-time as a Research Framework Consultation Lead supporting the renewal of Macquarie University’s Strategic Research Framework. In 2025, he participated in a US State Department International Visitor Leadership Program on Advancing STEM in the Quad.

He was a founding member of the CoESB’s Government and Industry Liaison Working Group and has written widely on the opportunities of biomanufacturing as an advanced and sustainable manufacturing technology. His multidisciplinary expertise centres on undertaking technological forecasting for bio-based capabilities and understanding their implications for biological intelligence collection (BIOINT), novel grey zone warfare strategies, operations and tactics, and dual-use biomanufacturing objectives.