Paul Watkins talks to Francesca Lake, Head of Open Access Publishing: Paul is The Howard Q Ferguson Professor in the Eshelman School of Pharmacy at The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill (UNC, NC, USA), and an expert in drug safety and drug-induced liver injury (DILI). Since its formation in 2009, he has been the director of the University of North Carolina Institute for Drug Safety Science. He is also Director of the DILI-sim Initiative and Chairman of the Board of Directors for the spin-off company, DILIsym Services, Inc. He is chair of the steering and genetics committees for the US Drug-Induced Liver Injury Network supported by the NIH and has been the recipient of a number of awards.