Professor Sean Smith is Chair of Future Construction, (School of Engineering) and Director of Centre for Future Infrastructure (Edinburgh Futures Institute) at the University of Edinburgh.

His previous roles have included being guest scientist at government construction and engineering research laboratories in Canada (NRC), Italy (IENGF) and Germany (PTB). His early applied research included noise and vibration in buildings, aircraft complex structures (funded by DERA and EPSRC) and over the past 15 years he has led extensive research with industry and public sector on sustainable construction, offsite systems, timber engineering and low carbon systems. He led the RSD project which formed Robust Details for Part E of the building regulations, now utilised in over one million homes in the UK, led the low carbon building technologies gateway supporting with colleagues over 200 products and systems to market. He has been an advisor to CEN and ISO committees and formed research networks with 40+ countries and authored reports for several government departments. He chaired the Scottish government review on future housing construction skills and his report recommendations were adopted in the programme for government 2020. He has twice led research teams which have been awarded the Queen’s Anniversary Prize and has over 40 project awards or nominations for industry joint projects due to the positive impact on the environment, society and economy. He serves on a range of external committees and boards involved in innovation, construction regulatory compliance, housing, infrastructure and skills.