Andrew Hitchcock is a molecular biologist and biochemist working on photosynthetic light harvesting and electron transfer in phototrophic microorganisms. He undertook a PhD at the University of Sheffield (2007-2011), working on the assembly of electron transport chains in the human pathogen Campylobacter jejuni under the supervision of Professor Dave Kelly. Following a postdoctoral position with Professor Tom Bibby at the University of Southampton (2011-2014) and a visiting research position at Imperial College London with Professor John Heap (2013-2014), he returned to Sheffield as a postdoctoral research associate with Professor Neil Hunter FRS (2014-2019). During his postdoctoral positions, Andrew developed a keen interest in pigment biosynthesis, light harvesting and electron transport in phototrophic bacteria, particularly how these processes could be engineered to improve photosynthetic energy generation, and in 2019 he was awarded a Royal Society University Research Fellowship to pursue this work. His fellowship combines fundamental biochemical research with synthetic and structural biology, using non-native combinations of pigments and proteins to reimagine photosynthesis for enhanced solar energy capture and utilisation, with the long-term vision of introducing light-powered metabolism to heterotrophic organisms. His research group is affiliated with the Plants, Photosynthesis and Soil and Molecular Microbiology: Biochemistry to Disease research clusters in the School of Biosciences at the University of Sheffield.
Dr Andrew Hitchcock
