Professor Alison Smith

Professor of Plant Biochemistry, interested in plant metabolism and metabolic engineering, particular of microalgae. Director of Algal Innovation Centre. Has served on Boards for NIAB, Marine Biological Association of the UK, BBSRC responsive mode and strategy panels, and currently member of scientific advisory boards for Manchester Institute for Biotechnology, the Quadram Institute and the European Algal Biomass Association.

Our research addresses several aspects of the metabolism of plants, algae and bacteria, in particular biosynthesis of vitamins, pigments and lipids, using a wide range of techniques from biochemistry through molecular biology to genomics. The knowledge gained from these studies is being used to explore the potential for metabolic engineering of high value products in plants and algae, using synthetic biology approaches to streamline strain engineering and to generate recoded or refactored versions of the entire chloroplast genome. We also have a scale-up facility to test routes to commericalise algal biotechnology.