Susan Gurney

Susan Gurney is an Associate Lecturer in the Biology Department at the University of St Andrews, actively teaching within the HHMI Science Education Alliance-Phage Hunters Advancing Genomics and Evolutionary Science (SEA-PHAGES) program since 2016. She has served as primary or additional instructor for over 24 course sections (including Bio 122, Bio 124, T180, and 61H-64H series) across multiple academic terms through 2020.

Her research focuses on bacteriophage biology with expertise in wet-lab phage discovery using Microbacterium foliorum and Mycobacterium smegmatis hosts, coupled with bioinformatics analysis of phage genomes. She develops curriculum integrating independent student research projects in phage genomics, spanning both in situ (microbiology) and in silico (computational) methodologies.

As a core SEA-PHAGES educator, Dr. Gurney has mentored more than 500 undergraduate students in discovery-based learning, emphasizing hands-on laboratory techniques and genomic annotation. Her collaborative work includes partnerships with instructors like Svetlana Khakhina and Alison Moyer across the program's international consortium.

Contact: smrw@st-andrews.ac.uk