Professor Silburn graduated with honours in science from the University of Newcastle and Medicine from The University of Queensland Australia. He completed his Neurology training at the Radcliffe Infirmary in Oxford in the Australian and New Zealand Association of Neurologists as a fellow in clinical neurology, as well as held a position as lecturer in Neurology at Oxford University. Before heading to the Karolinska Institute, Stockholm, as a Research Fellow in the Department of Molecular Medicine, he returned to Australia where he became a full Professor in Neuroscience at the University of Queensland.

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He has contributed to the establishment of a number of neuromodulation centres in Australia, training 85% of the DBS centres as well as those in the Asia Pacific region. The latter have included countries such as China, Thailand, Vietnam, Singapore, Malaysia, Indonesia, Japan and also Sweden.  He was a foundation member of Deep Brain Stimulation advisory groups for a number of Neuromodulation companies. 

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He has been directly involved in over 1200 functional neurosurgical cases and continues to contribute to the intraoperative targeting and neurophysiology assessments.  He has been invited as a guest speaker at numerous conferences to present at international meetings including plenary sessions and as a lecturer at inaugural international society meetings. 

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He is currently the Clinical and Education Director of the Asia Pacific Centre for Neuromodulation within the Queensland Brain Institute, considered as a premier research Neurosciences Institute in Australia. Professor Silburn has published 200 international peer reviewed papers in the field of Neurology and Neurosciences, particularly in the areas of Parkinson’s Disease, Molecular Neuroscience and Deep Brain Stimulation. For a full list of Professor Silburn’s publications please refer to the Queensland Brain Institute website.

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Professor Silburn has also served the Neurology and Parkinson’s disease community in positions such as President, Vice President and Patron of Parkinson's Queensland over the last 20 years. He has provided expert opinions to Government bodies, including the Australian Government as well as the Vatican.
 

Professor Silburn was appointed as a Member of the Order of Australia (AM) in the 2013 Australia Day Honours for his contribution to Neurology.