Tracy Hall

Tracy Hall is Professor in Software Engineering at Lancaster University's School of Computing and Communications, where she holds a Chair in Software Engineering Research and serves as Director of Post Graduate Teaching. Previously, she was Professor and Head of Computer Science at Brunel University London, and has held visiting positions at University College London and adjunct roles at the University of Oslo. With over 20 years of empirical software engineering research experience, she maintains extensive industrial collaborations.

Her research focuses on:

• Software defect prediction and automatic repair
• Code analysis methodologies
• Software testing frameworks
• Human factors in software development
• Empirical studies of developer behavior
• Tool development for software engineers

She leads research in automated defect repair techniques and vulnerability prediction, with recent work exploring AI-driven approaches to software quality improvement.

Her publication portfolio (100+ papers) shows consistent focus on software quality enhancement, with recent emphasis on explainable AI for vulnerability prediction (2025), developer-centric testing tools (2024), and human factors in bug resolution (2022). Research frequently involves large-scale empirical studies and industry partnerships.

Awards include multiple best paper awards for her contributions to software engineering research.

As Principal Investigator, she secured significant funding including:

• EPSRC Fixie project: £400,000 for defect prediction/repair (2018-2020)
• EPSRC Fault Analysis grant: £128,578 (2016-2019)

Current PhD supervisees include Gaz Bennett, Jesse Phillips, and Miles Walker working on software engineering challenges.

She contributes to the Cyber Security Research Centre, Security Lancaster, and DSI-Foundations research groups. Teaches courses on IT Architecture and Software Studio.