The main focus of Professor Cleare’s research is to continue work that improves the understanding of aetiology, neurobiology and long-term outcome of treatment-resistant depression, including clinical trials, optimising clinical tools and developing biomarkers for depression.  

He is Co-Director of the Centre for Affective Disorders at KCL, and Head of the Affective Disorders Research Group at the IoPPN, which works to understand more about the neurobiological causes of mood disorders and mental illnesses where the normal functioning of mood is disrupted, such as clinical depression and bipolar disorder. He is a Principal Investigator in the NIHR Maudsley Biomedical Research Centre, which researches new tests, treatments and theories in mental health.

Other research interests include clinical psychopharmacology, chronic fatigue syndrome, aggression and neuroimaging of serotonin receptor function.

Professor Cleare has over 380 peer reviewed and other publications, and has often contributed to books and national guidelines, including leading the British Association for Psychopharmacology Evidence-Based Guidelines for treating depressive disorders.

Anthony Cleare is Professor of Psychopharmacology & Affective Disorders at King’s College London, and a consultant psychiatrist at the Maudsley Hospital.  

He graduated from University College London and Guy’s Hospital Medical School in London, before training in psychiatry at the Maudsley, winning the Laughlin Prize of the Royal College of Psychiatrists. He was appointed consultant at the Maudsley in 1998 and Chair at the Institute of Psychiatry, KCL, in 2011.

In 1998, he obtained his PhD looking at neuroendocrine aspects of affective disorders, and has since continued an active research programme into all aspects of affective disorders. Awards for his research include the Sir Dennis Hill Prize and both Junior and Senior Clinical Psychopharmacology Awards from the British Association for Psychopharmacology.

Prof Cleare is currently consultant psychiatrist in The National Affective Disorders Service at the Maudsley Hospital, offering a tertiary care service specialising in the multidisciplinary assessment and treatment of patients with treatment resistant depression and bipolar disorder. He is also Consultant in Aviation Psychiatry to the Civil Aviation Authority. He has previously worked as a Liaison Psychiatrist in several medical clinics including a pain clinic, a chronic fatigue syndrome clinic, an endocrinology clinic and a general medical outpatient clinic.

Prof Cleare is current President of International Society for Affective Disorders, an elected Fellow of the Royal College of Psychiatrists, and a member of many scientific societies including the British Association for Psychopharmacology.