People
Harrison Steel
Associate Professor of Engineering Science
Bio: Harrison received BSc (Physics/Math) and BEng (Mechanical Engineering) degrees from the University of Sydney and went on to complete a D.Phil at the University of Oxford as a Monash Scholar. After Postdoctoral research at Oxford he joined the Department of Engineering Science in 2020 as an Associate Professor and Tutorial Fellow at Harris Manchester College.
Favourite Activities: Singing (in choir), Athletics (sprinting), and Cycling.
Links: Twitter – LinkedIn – Google Scholar – Control Group – Department
– 2024 MPLS Award for Outstanding Research Supervision
– 2023 RAEng Young Engineer of the Year and Sir George Macfarlane Medal
– 2023 MPLS Early Career Commercial Impact Prize
– 2022 Philip Leverhulme Prize in Engineering
Research Fellows & Staff
Dr Idris Kempf
Senior Research Associate
Bio: Idris holds a BSc in Mechanical Engineering and an MSc in Robotics, Systems and Control from ETH Zurich. After 3 years of industry experience, Idris pursued on a D.Phil at the University of Oxford in collaboration with Diamond Light Source. Currently, Idris is a Postdoctoral Researcher and Stipendiary Lecturer at Hertford College.
Favourite Activities: Sports (snowboarding, kitesurfing), Music (drums, clarinet), and Dancing (salsa).
Links: Personal Website – Google Scholar – Github
Dr Andreas Porse
Senior Research Associate
Bio: Andreas earned his PhD from the Technical University of Denmark, where he focused on the genetics and evolution of antibiotic resistance. Following his doctoral work, he spent five years at SNIPR Biome, developing a novel DNA delivery platform to target bacterial strains in the microbiome. Currently, Andreas is a Senior Research Associate, and his research explores evolutionary processes and drug resistance using the long-term evolution machine.
Favourite Activities:Hiking, maintaining a saltwater aquarium, AI, swing dancing, watching Peppa Pig with his son, and enjoying free food/coffee at Linacre College.
Links: LinkedIn, Google Scholar
Caleb Goddard
Senior Mechanical Engineer
Bio:Caleb received an MEng in Mechanical Engineering from Imperial College London. After working in the Space Industry for 4 years he joined the lab to help design and manufacture the next generation of the long-term evolution machine as part of the DARTS project (Defeating Antibiotic Resistance through Transformative Solutions).
Favourite Activities: Hiking with Dog, Camping without Dog, Board Games and Water Sports
Links: Linkedin
Dr Harman Mehta
Postdoctoral Research Associate
Bio: Harman received a B.Tech and M. Tech in Biochemical Engineering and Biotechnology with a minor in Robotics from IIT Delhi. She received her PhD in Bioengineering from Imperial College London as a President’s PhD Scholar. Currently, Harman works as a Postdoctoral researcher working on automated systems for 3D printing of living materials.
Favourite Activities: Reading, Dancing, Board Games, Travelling
Links: LinkedIn
Scott Stacey
Postdoctoral Research Associate
Bio: Scott received a BSc in Biological Sciences with a year in industry from Imperial College London. He is currently at Lincoln College on Oxford’s Interdisciplinary Bioscience DTP, with his research focusing on understanding and engineering Sponge RNAs in Bacteria. He completed his D.Phil. in the group in 2025.
Favourite Activities: Football; SynBio Society; enjoying Oxfordshire countryside; environmental rep for Lincoln’s MCR; far too many formal dinners.
Links: LinkedIn
Ting An Lee
Postdoctoral Research Associate
Bio: Ting received a BSc in Biotechnology and an MRes in Systems & Synthetic Biology at Imperial Colllege London. He started his DPhil in Engineering Science at Oxford in 2021, with a focus on methods of controlling microbial communities. He completed his D.Phil. in the group in 2025.
Favourite Activities: Badminton, frisbee, and enjoying free college food.
Links: LinkedIn
D.Phil. (PhD) Research Students
Lisa Zillig
D.Phil Student, co-supervised with Steve Kelly.
Bio: Lisa studied Biology (BSc and MSc) at the University Duisburg-Essen (Germany) and started her DPhil with the Interdisciplinary Bioscience DTP at Oxford in 2019.
Favourite Activities: Rowing, Mixed Martial Arts, Cycling (long distance trips), and Formal Dinners at my College (fueling up for all the sport again).
Links: LinkedIn – Steve Kelly Lab
Miroslav Gasparek
D.Phil Student, co-supervised with Antonis Papachristodoulou.
Bio: Miro received MEng in Biomedical Engineering from Imperial College London in 2019. He is currently pursuing DPhil in Engineering Science at Oxford, with a focus on Control Theory and engineering of biomolecular feedback systems.
Favourite Activities: Weightlifting (a. k. a. applied Biomechanics!), Oxford and European Synthetic Biology Societies, Entrepreneurship, Oxford Formals (to discuss everything but control theory and synthetic biology!)
Links: Twitter – LinkedIn – Personal Website
Olivia Gallupova
D.Phil Student
Bio: Olivia received an MEng in Molecular Bioengineering from Imperial College London and was on the 2020 Imperial iGEM team. She is currently at Wadham College pursuing a DPhil in Engineering Sciences doing research in computational methods for synthetic biology.
Favourite Activities: Playing saxophone and singing, SynBioUK, selling jewelry, skiing and surfing
Links: LinkedIn
Jessica James
D.Phil Student
Bio: Jess studied a BSc in Molecular and Cellular Biology at the University of Bath, including a yearlong industrial placement. She went on to study an MSc in Bioinformatics and Theoretical Systems Biology at Imperial College London, and now pursues a DPhil in Engineering Science.
Favourite Activities: Wild swimming (currently on the look out for spots in Oxford!), camping trips, painting (mostly watercolour), making her own clothes.
Links: LinkedIn
Kirill Sechkar
D.Phil Student
Bio: Kirill received an MEng in Molecular Bioengineering from Imperial College London in 2022. He is currently at The Queen’s College pursuing a DPhil in Engineering Science, investigating how different synthetic gene circuits interact with each other and with the cell hosting them.
Favourite Activities: Hiking around the spectacular English countryside, writing and reading poetry and prose.
Links: LinkedIn – Twitter
Sebastian Towers
D.Phil Student, co-supervised with Jakob Foerster
Bio: Sebastian studied Mathematics and Computer Science at the University of Oxford, before starting a DPhil with the AIMS CDT in 2021. He is currently under the co-supervision of Harrison Steel and Jakob Foerster, instigating the intersection of machine learning and evolving biological systems.
Favourite Activities: Ultimate frisbee, cooking, board and video games , YouTube edu-tainment.
Marco Corrao
D.Phil Student, co-supervised with Stephan Uphoff
Bio: Marco received a MEng in Molecular Bioengineering from Imperial College London in 2021. He then joined Oxford’s Interdisciplinary Bioscience DTP for his DPhil, working at the interface of modelling, control and automation in the context of adaptive laboratory evolution.
Favourite Activities: Running, swimming, playing guitar, and volunteering
Links: LinkedIn
Frank Yu
Part-time D.Phil Student
Bio:Frank received his HBSc in health and disease and MSc in physiology from the University of Toronto. His past experience was in large animal and human ex situ heart perfusion systems. He is now at St. Edmund Hall pursuing a part-time DPhil in Engineering Science. His main research focus is on mammalian bioreactors
Favourite Activities:Building water cooled computers, snowboarding, non-profit engagement, and swimming
Links: LinkedIn
Marina Luchner
D.Phil Student, co-supervised with M.Wood and S. Sanders
Bio: Marina studied Biochemistry (BSc) at the Technical University of Munich (Germany) with a stint as visiting student at the University of Oxford. She then returned to Oxford to pursue the Interdisciplinary Biosciences Doctoral Training Programme, focusing on machine-learning assisted protein engineering.
Favourite Activities: Rowing, running, and cooking with housemates (see Gabriel Abrahams).
Links: LinkedIn
Gabriel Abrahams
D.Phil Student
Bio: Gabriel received a BSc in physics/maths and an MSc in physics both from the University of Melbourne. Prior to moving to Oxford he was a research assistant at RMIT investigating quantum sensing. He is currently pursuing a DPhil on the Interdisciplinary Biosciences DTP, focusing on protein engineering.
Favourite Activities: Hiking, piano, and cooking with housemates (see Marina Luchner).
Links: LinkedIn – Google Scholar – Github
Vicente Trelles Fernandez
D.Phil Student
Bio: Vicente received a BSc from The University of Edinburgh in 2020 and an MSc from ETH Zurich in 2023, both in Biotechnology. He is now pursuing a DPhil in Engineering Science, investigating ways to improve directed evolution methods in bacteria.
Favourite Activities: Karate, Writing
Links: LinkedIn
Agrima Deedwania
D.Phil Student, co-supervised by Jani Bolla
Bio: Agrima received a B.Tech in Biochemical Engineering and Biotechnology from the Indian Institute of Technology, Delhi. After undergrad, she worked as a research scientist in a MedTech startup: Inito. She is currently pursuing a DPhil on the Interdisciplinary Biosciences DTP, focusing on protein engineering and antimicrobial resistance.
Favourite Activities: Badminton, hiking, cooking and watching pretty skies
Links: LinkedIn – Personal Website
Svenja Lützow
D.Phil Student
Bio: Svenja received a BSc and MSc in Molecular and Applied Biotechnology from RWTH Aachen University. After two years of industry experience, she started a DPhil in Engineering Science at Jesus College in 2024.
Favourite Activities: Yoga, reading, skiing, surfing
Angel Xia
D.Phil Student, co-supervised with Antonis Papachristodoulou
Bio: Angel studied BSc in Biochemistry and subsequently a MRes in Cellular and Molecular Biosciences at Imperial College London. Prior to Oxford she also worked as a research assistant on mammalian cell free synthesis of vaccines. She is now pursuing a DPhil in Engineering Science at Wadham with a focus on applications and control of adaptive laboratory evolution.
Favourite Activities: My two cats, Badminton, Climbing, Baking and cooking , Video games (in moderation whoops).
Joshua Pearson
D.Phil Student
Bio: Joshua studied the Engineering Science undergraduate degree at Oxford. His research is applying control theory to unstable biological systems to accelerate Adaptive Laboratory Evolution. Prior to starting at Oxford, he spent a year at an engineering consultancy, where he – amongst other things – investigated the science of coffee.
Favourite Activities: Running, hiking and cooking new recipes.
Links: LinkedIn
Robin Henry
D.Phil Student, co-supervised with Jean Baptiste Lugagne
Bio: Robin received an MEng in Electronics and Computer Science from The University of Edinburgh in 2021, after which he worked for the Oxford-based startup Habitat Energy as a Data Scientist for 3 years. He’s now at Reuben pursuing a DPhil with the Engineering Biology CDT, studying single-cell control and related applications.
Favourite Activities: Football, hiking/camping/backpacking, and reading.
Links: LinkedIn – Google Scholar – Github
Jack Dalton
D.Phil Student, co-supervised with Jean Baptiste Lugagne
Bio: Jack studied Molecular Bioengineering at Imperial College London before transferring to the Australian National University where he completed a PhB (Science)(Honours) researching enzyme engineering. He is currently pursuing a D.Phil focussing on adaptive laboratory evolution and optimising biomanufacturing using machine learning as a Ramsay Scholar on the EngBioCDT.
Favourite Activities: Hiking, Skiing, Mountain Biking, Photography, Walking dogs
Links: LinkedIn – Website
Tiga Khalek
D.Phil Student
Bio: Tiga received an MSci in Natural Sciences from the University of Exeter in 2024. She is currently pursuing a DPhil on the Interdisciplinary
Biosciences DTP at Wolfson College.
Favourite Activities: Baking, reading, hiking, salsa, running
Links: LinkedIn
Yuhang Xie
D.Phil Student, co-supervised with Jean Baptiste Lugagne
Bio: Yuhang studied Natural Sciences (BA, MSc) at the University of Cambridge, specialising into biological chemistry. Subsequently, he worked in biotech consulting at TTP for three years before starting a Dphil with the Interdisciplinary Biosciences DTP in 2024.
Favourite Activities: Cooking, writing, performing improvised comedy
Links: Linkedin
Photo Gallery
Most of the group, and collaborators, at Lab Retreat near South Downs National Park (April 2025)
Most of the group at SynBioUK 2023 in Bristol (November 2023)
Group visit to Hardwick Hall while en route to SynBioUK 2022 (November 2022)
Alumni
Dr Simona Della Valle
Finished Oct 2023, co-supervised with Wei Huang.
Bio: Simona started her DPhil in 2018 at Oxford’s SynBio CDT, with research focusing on engineering bacteria for sustainable biomanufacturing. She subsequently took up a postdoctoral position at the University of Western Australia.
Favourite Activities: Powerlifting with the Linacre Ladies that Lift, birdwatching, and performing stand-up comedy.
Links: Twitter
Dr John Allan
Postdoctoral Researcher 2022-2024
Bio: John worked with our team as a postdoctoral researcher, developing microbial communities for biomanufacturing, and understanding their behaviours in Chi.Bio reactors. He subsequently took up a permanent teaching position at Newcastle College.
Favourite Activities: Drawing and painting, reading and buying books, walking and cycling. Community Biotech.
Links: Twitter
Jan Morlock
Masters Student, 2023-2024
Bio: Jan received a BSc in Mechanical Engineering from ETH Zurich in 2021. As part of his Master’s in Robotics, Systems, and Control at ETH Zurich, he worked with our team developing control systems for microbial communities.
Favourite Activities:Handball, Beach volleyball, Triathlon, and enjoying amazing British food.
Links: LinkedIn
Dr Thomas Mulroney
Senior Research Associate
Bio: Tom worked with our team on Biomedical applications of Synthetic Biology. In 2025 he went on to start his own research group in Oxford’s Institute of Developmental and Regenerative Medicine.
Favourite Activities: Squash, hiking, and cooking.
Links: Linkedin
