The University of Edinburgh is one of the largest universities in the UK. It is Scotland's premier research University and was graded among the top UK Universities in the most recent national Research Assessment Exercise.

It has over 7000 staff and a student population of some 20,000. The University consists of twenty-one academic Schools organised into three Colleges - Science and Engineering; Medicine and Veterinary Medicine; and Humanities and Social Sciences.

SynthSys at the University of Edinburgh is a BBSRC/EPSRC/MRC Synthetic Biology Research Centre. Originally established in 2007 as a Centre for Integrative Systems Biology (CISB), funded by the BBSRC and the EPSRC, today, many of its experimental and theoretical researchers continue to be co-located in the purpose-built CH Waddington building situated on the King’s Buildings campus. However, SynthSys embraces a much large research community of over 40 research groups from across the University. Their research in synthetic and systems biology is wide ranging and broadly fits within three main themes: mammalian systems; plants; and industrial biotechnology.