Eriko Takano
Professor of Synthetic Biology, University of Manchester
Eriko Takano is a multi-award winning, world-leading researcher and Co-Director of the Manchester Synthetic Biology Research Centre (SYNBIOCHEM), whose research focuses on the synthetic biology of antibiotic production. After completing her undergraduate studies at Kitasato University in Japan, Eriko worked as a Research Assistant for a pharmaceutical firm. She subsequently completed her PhD at the University of East Anglia (UK), before becoming an Assistant Professor at the University of Tübingen (Germany) in 2000 and at the University of Groningen (Netherlands) in 2006. Eriko moved to the University of Manchester (UK) in 2012 as Professor of Synthetic Biology, becoming the Director of SYNBIOCHEM in 2014. This international career path has meant Eriko has also been highly successful in securing funding from a wide variety of funding agencies, including UK Research and Innovation (UK), the Technology Agency STW (Netherlands), the Dutch Research Council (Netherlands), Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (Germany) and Horizon 2020 (EU).