Professor David Salt

David Salt is a Professor of Genome Enabled Biology in the School of Biosciences. His research focuses on the molecular mechanisms that plants use to take up and accumulate the essential mineral nutrients that they need for normal growth and development. He is also interested in how plants mistakenly accumulate potentially toxic trace elements such as cadmium and arsenic. These issues are important for agriculture, human health as plants are a major source of dietary mineral, and food safety due to accumulation of potentially toxic trace elements in food.

Professor Salt is also the academic lead for the University's Future Food Beacon of Excellence which is addresses the challenge of feeding a growing population in a changing world.

The Future Food Beacon brings together expertise from across the food chain – from soil to molecule to meal – to deliver sustainable solutions to global food challenges such as ‘hidden hunger’: less diverse diets, naturally low nutrients in our staple crops, and an increasing reliance on over-processed foods mean that more than a quarter of the world population are not getting the goodness they need from what they eat.

Asia Expertise: Mapping China's national policy key areas in food and agriculture, and identified three top priority areas: 1. Modernisation of seed industry; 2. Mechanisation of agriculture; 3. Informatisation of agriculture