Our people

Dr Benjamin Woolf is a genetic epidemiologist who works on casual inference from observational data. His research focuses on using the inheritance of genetic variation to emulate randomised control trials, and thereby accelerate drug development.

Having failed to become a philosopher, Benji became a genetic epidemiologist. He currently works at the Medical Research Council Biostatistics and Integrative Epidemiology Units (at the Universities of Cambridge and Bristol respectively). His research leverages the random inheritance of genes to emulate clinical trials ('Mendelian randomization'), and thereby accelerate drug development for cardiovascular and respiratory conditions. His PhD research won the 2023 Cambridge Public Health Early Carer Researcher award for developing a novel approach to assess the causal impact of intergenerational risk factors, such as familial second-hand smoke exposure.

In addition to being an Associate Tutor at St Edmunds, Benji is a tutor at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine and has been elected a fellow of the Royal Society of Arts.

Publications

Emeritus Fellow. Former Co-Director of the Von Hugel Institute and tutor

I am an Assyriologist based at Tyndale House, Cambridge, researching scribal practices and onomastics (personal names) in ancient Mesopotamia and the Levant. At St Edmund’s I am a Bye-Fellow and Associate Tutor.

Dr J. Caleb Howard is an Assyriologist who studies the languages, texts, and history of ancient Mesopotamia and the Levant. He is a Research Fellow in Old Testament and Ancient Near East at Tyndale House, Cambridge, where he spends most of his time. He is also editor of Tyndale’s academic journal, Tyndale Bulletin. At St Edmund’s College, he is Bye-Fellow and Associate Tutor.

Dr Howard’s research focuses on two periods of ancient history and their textual corpora. First, he researches scribal practices in the Neo-Assyrian state, which flourished in northern Iraq, ca. 1000-600 B.C. His current book project investigates the mechanics of scribal production of Neo-Assyrian royal inscriptions, the propaganda of the Assyrian state. The basis of this project is first-hand collation and photography of royal inscriptions of the king Ashurnasirpal II (883-859 B.C.) in various museum collections.

A part of Dr Howard’s research on the Neo-Assyrian empire is carried out within the framework of the Cambridge-LMU Strategic Partnership, one aim of which is to publish up-to-date editions of Assyrian royal inscriptions, both online and in print publications. In cooperation with Dr Jamie Novotny (LMU) and Professor A. Kirk Grayson (University of Toronto), Dr Howard is preparing an updated edition of the royal inscriptions of Ashurnasirpal II. Transcriptions and translations of these inscriptions will be made available to scholars and the public via an online repository of cuneiform texts called Oracc (Open Richly Annotated Cuneiform Corpus).

Dr Howard’s second major research focus is personal names in the Levant in the second and first millennia B.C. At Tyndale House, Cambridge, he is part of a team of researchers collecting personal names from relevant primary sources and analysing them, to see what they tell us about the linguistic and social history of the region. This work will be documented in an open-access database and in a set of print publications. Dr Howard’s main research contribution to the project is a study of the personal names in about five hundred cuneiform tablets from the ancient city of Alalakh (Tell Atchana) in southern Turkey. These texts contain thousands of personal names, mainly derived from one or more West Semitic languages and from the Hurrian language. These names reveal aspects of language, religion, and culture which would otherwise be inaccessible to modern research.

Academic Profile

Camilla is currently a Consultant in the Animal Production and Health Division of the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO). Prior to that she was a Senior Lecturer in Virology and Course Director for the MSc in One Health at the Royal Veterinary College, University of London.

Camilla has a degree in veterinary medicine, MA in Zoology and PhD in the molecular virology of influenza virus from the University of Cambridge (St. Catharine’s College), awarded in 2010. She was a Postdoctoral Research Associate at Imperial College London and the Department of Pathology, University of Cambridge, where she worked on virus immunomodulation and virus-vectored recombinant vaccines.

Her research has focused on virus cross-species transmission, and she is interested in infectious diseases at the human-wildlife-livestock interface and the One Health approach.

Camilla is also an Associate Tutor here at St Edmund’s.

My research interests lie in health law and ethics, particularly informed consent, doctor-patient relationship, and reproductive ethics widely considered.

Dr Milo is Lecturer in Law at the School of Law, University of Sheffield, where she leads the Health Law Research Group. Before joining Sheffield, she was College Assistant Professor and Fellow in Law at Robinson College-University of Cambridge, and previously Lecturer at the University of Exeter Law School. She holds a PhD in Health Law from Durham Law School; a MA in Bioethics and Medical Law (St Mary’s University-Twickenham); an integrated MA in Law (University of Siena, Italy); and a Diploma in Legal Studies (University of Oxford).

Academic Profile

Dr Chen Chen is also a Senior Member at St Edmunds College.

Dr Chen Chen's research interests are broadly in areas of EdgeAI, Serverless Computing, Cloud/Edge Computing, Network Resource Orchestration, In-network Computing, Distributed System and IoTs.

Chen is a Postdoctoral Researcher with the System Research Group, Department of Computer Science and Technology, University of Cambridge. In SRG, Chen works on the EDGELESS project with Professor Richard Mortier, exploring the opportunities for efficient virtualization in small edge devices for serverless computing. Chen is also a Senior Member at St Edmunds College.

Prior to that, Chen received his PhD in Computer Science from Loughborough Univeristy (LU), UK with a full scholarship. Chen received his BEng from Xidian University, Xi’an, China. His research interests are broadly in areas of Serverless Computing, Cloud/Edge Computing, Network Resource Orchestration, In-network Computing, Distributed System and IoTs. His latest work focuses on resource orchestration in serverless edge computing, aiming to optimize the overall performance for the system, including latency, energy consumption and system cost. Chen has extensive experience collaborating with industries such as Siemens, Infineon, EMS-UK, National Physical Lab and many others.

Also, Chen is actively serving as a TPC member and reviewer for many conferences and journals such as ICDCS 2024, IFIP NPC 2024, IEEE MSN 2023, IEEE TSC, Computer Networks, JNCA and etc. Chen also holds an Associate Fellowship of Higher Education Academy.

Chris is a Research Associate in the Centre for Photonic Devices and Sensors specialising in liquid crystal displays and scalable manufacturing processes. He completed his PhD in electronic engineering at St. Edmund’s College.

He has developed an electrically switchable window capable of reflecting heat, controlling privacy, and displaying images while using no continuous power. To commercialise this innovation, he cofounded Flexypix in 2016 and was awarded an Enterprise Fellowship from the Royal Academy of Engineering to pursue this venture.

His wider interests include playing the guitar, photography, and motorcycles.

Claire is Director of Studies for Manufacturing Engineering

Corinne is Director of Studies for our Archaeology degree

Dr Cristiano Longarini is a PDRA at St Edmund's College.

His research focuses on astrophysics, with a particular interest in planet formation. His is currently a Postdoctoral Associate at the Institute of Astronomy, and his work combines theoretical modelling, numerical simulations, and data analysis to explore the processes driving planet formation.

Dr. Cristiano Longarini is a postdoctoral associate at the Institute of Astronomy, specialising in planet formation and protoplanetary disc dynamics. His research explores the role of gravitational instabilities in shaping planetary systems, combining theoretical modelling, numerical simulations, and observational data analysis. He has contributed to large observational programs, and has expertise in interpreting high-resolution data from ALMA telescope.

David is Director of Studies for Anglo-Saxon, Norse and Celtic

Dr Alexander spent 40 years in the sciences, first in the field of neurochemistry, then human genetics, and finally in molecular immunology, spending 15 years helping to develop new science initiatives in the Middle East. Dr Alexander is also engaged in the academic field of science and religion.

Dr Alexander was an Open Scholar at Oxford University reading Biochemistry [1964-1968] before a PhD in Neurochemistry at the Institute of Psychiatry, London University [1968-1971]. This was followed by a period of 15 years helping to develop scientific research in the Middle East [1971 – 1986], first in Ankara, Turkey, at Hacettepe University and the Middle East Technical University, and then as Associate Professor of Biochemistry on the medical faculty of the American University of Beirut, Lebanon, where he helped to establish the National Unit of Human Genetics in the Department of Pediatrics. Working in Beirut [1981-1986] involved three evacuations due to political violence. After the third and final evacuation Dr Alexander returned to the UK to take up a position as a Visiting Research Fellow at the Imperial Cancer Research Fund [now Cancer Research UK] in London [1986 – 1989], before becoming a Project Leader at The Babraham Institute, and establishing a new research laboratory in molecular immunology, initially entitled the ‘T Cell Laboratory’. Dr Alexander eventually became Head of this expanded laboratory, incorporating the research teams of five Project Leaders, re-named as the Laboratory of Lymphocyte Signalling and Development, also becoming Chair of the Programme of Molecular Immunology. During this period Dr Alexander had consultancies with Biogen and GenMab; served on the Babraham Executive Committee and on the BBSRC Biochemistry and Cell Biology Grants Committee; and became a Fellow of St. Edmund’s College in 1997. During his final two years at The Babraham Institute [2006 – 2008], Dr Alexander worked as a part-time Senior Affiliated Scientist.

Upon retirement from active science, Dr Alexander further developed his interests in the academic field of science and religion, co-founding The Faraday Institute for Science and Religion as part of St. Edmund’s College in 2006, and becoming the Institute’s first director from 2006 – 2012. He became a Founding Fellow of the International Society for Science and Religion in 2001, serving on its Executive Committee; Editor of the Journal Science and Christian Belief, 1992-2013; and served from 2008 - 2014 as a Trustee of the John Templeton Foundation and the Templeton World Charity Foundation, and on the Steering Committee of the Templeton Religion Trust. Having given the Gifford Lectures at St. Andrews University in 2012, these lectures were published by CUP under the title Genes, Determinism and God. By 2017 The Faraday Institute had become too large to stay in College and so moved to become a tenant of the Woolf Building on the grounds of Westminster College, signing an academic agreement with St. Edmund’s College and becoming a member of the Cambridge Theological Federation. Dr Alexander was Chair of the Board of Trustees of The Faraday Institute from 2017 – 2024. Dr Alexander continues to publish and speak widely in the UK and internationally in the field of science and religion.

Publications

• Denis Alexander, Are We Slaves to Our Genes? 2023. Cambridge University Press.
• Zhao, R., Follows, G.A., Beer, P.A., Scott, L.M., Huntly, B.J.P, Green, A.R. and Alexander, D.R. ‘Inhibition of the Bcl-xL deamidation pathway in myeloproliferative disorders’ (2008). New England J. Medicine, 359: 2778-2789.
• McNeill, L. Salmond, R.J. Cooper, J.C., Carret, C.K., Cassady-Cain, R.L., Roche-Molina, M., Tandon, P., Holmes, N. and Alexander, D.R. ‘The differential regulation by CD45 of Lck kinase phosphorylation sites is critical for TCR signaling thresholds’ (2007). Immunity 27: 425-437.
• Zhao, R., Yang, F.-T., and Alexander, D.R. ‘An oncogenic tyrosine kinase inhibits DNA repair and DNA damage-induced Bcl-xL deamidation in T cell transformation’ (2004). Cancer Cell, 5: 37-49.
• Denis Alexander, Rebuilding the Matrix - Science and Faith in the 21st Century, 2001. Oxford: Lion.

Dunya Habash is a Postdoctoral Research Associate at the Faculty of Education, University of Cambridge. Her interdisciplinary research explores the intersection of aesthetics, the arts, forced migration, integration, and education in post-conflict settings. She completed a PhD in Ethnomusicology at the University of Cambridge in 2023. Through a Woolf Institute Cambridge Scholarship and under the supervision of Dr Matthew Machin-Autenrieth, her ethnographic research with Syrian musicians and artists in Türkiye examined the effects of ‘integration’ on performance practices and cultural education among Syrian communities post-displacement. Before and during her PhD studies, Dunya worked as a Public Engagement Coordinator and Outreach Officer at the Woolf Institute. Through these roles she developed and disseminated an interfaith workshop programme based on the institute's Living in Harmony research project alongside a series of teacher resources for RE educators. She is also a Teaching Fellow at CRASSH’s Global History Lab and an affiliated researcher at the Woolf Institute. Her research has been supported by the British Forum for Ethnomusicology, the Royal Musical Association, the Music & Letters Trust, and the Cambridge Trust.