Worked as assistant to W. H. Bragg at University College, London, 1921-1923, and the Royal Institution, London, 1923-1928. He was appointed Lecturer, 1928-1937, and then Reader, 1937-1945, in Textile Physics at Leeds University, where he became the first Professor of Biomolecular Structure, 1945-1961. His work, mainly supported by the Rockefeller Foundation, was primarily on the structure of biological tissues and proteins, using X-ray diffraction analysis and electron microscopy. At one time Astbury's laboratory at Leeds was at the forefront of electron microscopy studies in Britain, and he was credited with the invention of the term 'molecular biology.' Astbury served on the editorial boards of many journals (including from its inception, Biochimica et Biophysica Acta) and was a founder member of the Electron Microscopy Group of the Institute of Physics. He was elected FRS in 1940.