Dr James Abbott

James Abbott specialises in the field of computational biology – the application of computational methods to addressing biological questions. He has a long-term interest in raising awareness of how computational methods can progress biological understanding, with a track record in delivering training and contributing to outreach activities in these areas.

His career began in plant molecular biology, obtaining a PhD at the University of Dundee, before moving into the computational field. His entire post-doctoral career has been working within ‘core’ bioinformatics teams, which work to provide collaborative expertise in computational methods to a broad range of projects. Following three years at Zeneca Agrochemicals/Syngenta, James moved to Imperial College London in 2005, where he worked initially as a bioinformatics software developer, and later as lead bioinformatician within the Bioinformatics Data Science Group. He returned to Dundee in 2018 to take up the position of Data Analysis Group manager, and from June 2022 has held a split role between Data Analysis Group manager and a teaching position as Senior Lecturer in Bioinformatics.