Tobias Schäffter studied electrical engineering and computer science at TU-Berlin until 1993 and obtained his PhD degree in magnetic resonance (MR) spectroscopic imaging at University Bremen (Prof. Leibfritz) in 1996. From 1996-2006, he worked as a Principal Scientist at the Philips Research Laboratories in Hamburg (Germany). He was responsible for the development of new MR-acquisition and reconstruction techniques as well as investigation of MR-compatible devices. He managed the clinical evaluation and product integration of industrial research.

In April 2006, Professor Schäffter took up the post as the Philip Harris Professor of Imaging Sciences at King’s College London. He was department head of biomedical engineering and the deputy head of the division in imaging sciences. He taught in the BSc and MSc programmes of Biomedical Engineering and was the director of the EPSRC doctorial training centre in medical imaging between King’s and Imperial College London.

Since 2015 he heads the Division 8 of Medical Physics and Metrological Information Technology at Physikalisch-Technische Bundesanstalt (PTB) in Berlin, where he is responsible for the development of new quantitative measurement and reference techniques in medicine. He is the co-Spokesman of the doctoral training centre in quantitative Imaging of biophysical parameter BioQic at Charité Berlin. Since 2019 he is also a Professor in Biomedical Imaging at Technical University Berlin and the Einstein Centre Digital Future. Tobias Schäffter is member of the Berlin-Brandenburg Academy of Sciences.