Susan is Professor of Synthetic Biology and Royal Academy of Engineering (RAEng) Chair in Emerging Technologies at the University of Edinburgh.

She is the Director of the UK Centre for Mammalian Synthetic Biology, Director of the UKRI Engineering Biology Hub for Advanced Therapeutics and Co-director of the Edinburgh Genome Foundry for synthetic DNA synthesis and assembly. She also held a prestigious Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC) Leadership Fellowship in Synthetic Biology.

In 2022, her work was recognised by the national academies of both Scotland and Wales, being elected as a Fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh (RSE) and Fellow of the Learned Society of Wales.

She served as a member of the Scottish Science Advisory Council, Scotland’s highest level science advisory body, providing independent advice and recommendations on science strategy, policy and priorities to the Scottish Government.

Susan’s research focuses on using synthetic biology approaches for developing and controlling genetic circuits for applications in cell and gene therapies as well as metabolic engineering.

She is co-founder of two early-stage start-ups using a combination of AI and engineering biology for new gene therapies and enzyme replacement therapies for rare diseases.