David Greaves is Professor of Inflammation Biology at the Dunn School. He did a first degree in microbiology and biochemistry at the University of Bristol before going to King's College, London for his PhD. He worked on the expression of the beta globin gene in the same laboratory where Maurice Wilkins and Rosalind Franklin had carried out their studies of the structure of DNA.

A first post-doctoral position took him to Amsterdam to work on gene expression in trypanosomes. He returned to the UK to join the National Institute for Medical Research at Mill Hill before briefly working in the laboratories of GD Searle Monsanto. His return to academic research in 1993 came in the form of a post-doctoral position with Siamon Gordon at the Dunn School, using transgenic models to study the role of macrophages in inflammation.

Since 1999 he has continued this work as a group leader, also developing the use of live-cell imaging to study the process of phagocytosis. Since the early 2000s Greaves has been responsible for organising the teaching of pathology and microbiology to up to 150 medical students per year.