The Scientists are a post-punk band from Perth, Western Australia, led by Kim Salmon, initially known as the Exterminators and then the Invaders. The band had two primary incarnations: the Perth-based punk band of the late 1970s and the Sydney/London-based swamp rock band of the 1980s.

Kim Leith Salmon is an Australian rock musician and songwriter from Perth. He has worked in various groups including The Scientists, Beasts of Bourbon, Kim Salmon and the Surrealists, Kim Salmon and the Business, and Darling Downs. Australian rock musicologist, Ian McFarlane, described Salmon as one of the first Australians to "embrace wholeheartedly the emergent punk phenomenon of the mid-to-late 1970s" with The Scientists. He declared that Beasts of Bourbon were "masters of uncompromising gutbucket blues and hard-edged rock'n'roll". In 2004 Salmon was inducted into the West Australian Music Industry Association Hall of Fame and in 2007, into the Music Victoria Awards Hall of Fame.