Dr Sarah Montgomery
Postdoctoral Fellow
Alumni
This person is a member of Sanger Institute Alumni.
Sarah’s background is in synthetic organic chemistry, which led her to pursue doctoral research in biocatalysis – the use of enzymes to produce high-value chemicals including drugs. During her PhD, Sarah studied protein structure-activity relationships using a combination of high-throughput screening and phylogenetics.
This research led Sarah to develop new interests in synthetic biology, whereby scientists can culture microorganisms to perform challenging chemistry and improve people’s lives. Among the many applications of synthetic biology is the use of live baker’s yeast to assemble large pieces of DNA. This allows scientists to build genes and even entire genomes from scratch, sometimes making fundamental changes that test our understanding of the central dogma of molecular biology.
Working with associate facuty Jason Chin, Tom Ellis, Patrick Cai and Kaihang Wang, Sarah is motivated to break new ground by bringing synthetic genomics to the Sanger Institue, and open up new avenues towards understanding our genome.
My timeline
Joined Wellcome Sanger Institute as a postdoctoral fellow in Synthetic Genomics.
PhD in chemistry, University of Manchester: Discovery, characterisation and application of imine reductases for biocatalytic reductive amination. Supervised by Prof. Nick Turner at the Manchester Institute of Biotechnology.
Industrial placement at Johnson Matthey, Cambridge Science Park.
MChem in chemistry with study in America, University of Sheffield.
Year abroad at the University of Texas at Austin. Undergraduate research project supervised by Prof. Mike Krische.