David Hornby is a Professor of Biochemistry at the University of Sheffield and is currently on secondment as Director of Innovation at the Liverpool Life Sciences University Technical College. David studied Biochemistry at the University of Sheffield, obtaining his PhD in 1984. This was followed by a period of research at the Biozentrum of the University of Basel, on the enzymes that modify bacterial genomes. Since 1986, he has held a number of academic positions at the University of Sheffield, was appointed to a Chair in Biochemistry in 1999 and in 2007 he became Head of the Department of Molecular Biology and Biotechnology.
David’s research has led to a number of commercial collaborations with companies in the USA and the UK. He is also closely involved in the teaching of Life Sciences and has been the external examiner for many UK Universities, which currently includes the Universities of Cambridge and Lancaster. His involvement in Higher education has also led to the establishment of the first Molecular Life Sciences undergraduate programme in the Gulf States.
More recently, after his tenure as Head of Department, David spent a year as a sabbatical visitor at the Liverpool School of Tropical Medicine and is currently in the second year of a two year secondment at the Life Sciences UTC, where he has developed a School Natural Sciences Programme, which is aimed to address concerns from Universities, Politicians and Employers relating to school Science education. He also serves on the Sheffield UTC steering group, in Engineering, Computing and Human Sciences and a number of research funding and publishing organisations.