Neil Turok has led the scientific and strategic growth of Perimeter Institute since October 2008. Like his colleague and collaborator Stephen Hawking, Neil’s field of research is theoretical cosmology: understanding the universe and its origins. He predicted two key features of the cosmic background radiation, subsequently observed, which confirmed the presence of dark energy and helped fix the character of the density variations which gave rise to galaxies. Neil pioneered two of today's leading cosmological theories: open inflation and the cyclic universe, and efforts to understand the big bang singularity. He has contributed to many fields of physics, from models of the origin of matter now being tested at the Large Hadron Collider to the topological defects observed in liquid crystals. Prior to joining Perimeter, Neil was Professor of Theoretical Physics at Princeton and then held the Chair of Mathematical Physics at Cambridge. Born in South Africa, he founded the African Institute for Mathematical Sciences (AIMS), a growing network of centres which is helping to unlock and nurture scientific talent across the African continent and now a centerpiece of Perimeter's Global Outreach efforts.