Professor Louise Horsfall

Professor Louise Horsfall, Chair of Sustainable Biotechnology at the University of Edinburgh, is interested in applying synthetic biology to improve the sustainability of biological processes and products. She was a founding member of the European Federation of Biotechnology (EFB) Bioengineering and Bioprocessing Division and now serves as an elected academic representative of the EFB’s Executive Board. Louise also represents the Microbiology Society on the Scottish Parliamentary Cross-Party Group on Science and Technology. She is a member of the European Synthetic Biology Society and SynBioUK Advisory Boards, EPSRC’s Strategic Advisory Team for manufacturing and circular economy, BBSRC Strategy Advisory Panel for advanced manufacturing and clean growth, the Carbon Technology Research Foundation Advisory Council and the Scottish Science Advisory Council – providing independent advice and recommendations on science strategy, policy and priorities to the Scottish Government. Louise is a CO-I on the FI ReLiB project and in 2024 she and her research group won the grand prize in “Top 10 Global Science and Technology Innovation Awards” at the 2050NOW La Maison’s global trends forum for their work on engineering bacteria to recover valuable metals from spent lithium batteries in electric vehicles.