Adam David Rutherford (born 1975) is a British geneticist and science populariser. He was an audio-visual content editor for the journal Nature for a decade, and is a frequent contributor to the newspaper The Guardian. He hosts the BBC Radio 4 programmes Inside Science and (with Hannah Fry) The Curious Cases of Rutherford and Fry; has produced several science documentaries; and has published books related to genetics and the origin of life.
He is an honorary senior research associate in the division of biosciences at University College London.
Rutherford became President of Humanists UK in June 2022, succeeding Alice Roberts.
Early life and education
Rutherford, who is half-Guyanese Indian, was born in Ipswich in the East of England and attended Ipswich School.
He was admitted to the medical school at University College London, but transferred to a degree in evolutionary genetics, including a project under Steve Jones studying stalk-eyed flies. He was awarded a PhD in genetics in 2002 by University College London for research completed at the UCL Institute of Child Health at Great Ormond Street Hospital supervised by Jane Sowden. His PhD investigated the role of the gene CHX10 on eye development, with focus on the effect of mutations in this gene on the development of eye disorders.
Rutherford's other academic research was also on genetic causes of eye disorders, including the relation of retinoschisin to retinoschisis, the role of mutations of the gene CRX in retinal dystrophy, and the role of the gene CHX10 in microphthalmia in humans and mice.
Career
Rutherford published a book on the topic of the creation of life. The United Kingdom printing has been called "two books in one", since Creation: The Origin of Life and Creation: The Future of Life are printed back-to-back so that one can read the book from either end. Among its topics, the first part of the book argues in support of the theory, first proposed by Thomas Gold, that life emerged not in primordial warm ponds, but in extremophile conditions in the deep ocean, while the second part discusses synthetic biology – the use of genetic modification to create new organisms. In the U.S., this book is published in a more conventional format with the title Creation: How Science Is Reinventing Life Itself. He was also one of the authors whose works are included in the compilation The Atheist's Guide to Christmas.
Rutherford was the Podcast Editor and the audio-video editor for the journal Nature until 2013, being responsible for all the publication's published audio, video, and podcasts. He also published audio interviews with notable personalities, including Paul Bettany on his role playing Charles Darwin in the movie Creation, and David Attenborough in his documentary Charles Darwin and the Tree of Life. He wrote editorials on diverse other topics, ranging from the overlap of art and science to reviews of science-themed movies.
Rutherford is a frequent contributor to The Guardian, writing primarily on science topics. He wrote a blog series covering his thoughts and analysis while re-reading Charles Darwin's On the Origin of Species, and has written articles supporting the teaching of evolution in schools, and criticizing the teaching of creationism as science.
He also writes on religion, notably a 10-part series on his experience participating in the Alpha course, and on New Age themes and alternative medicine, including a review critical of Rupert Sheldrake's A New Science of Life, and criticism of the lack of controls on advertising claims for homeopathy.
As a guest writer, he published an article in Wired on the possibility of using DNA for information storage.
Rutherford has returned to University College London, where he is an honorary senior research associate in the division of biosciences and teaches courses on genetics and communications.
Broadcasting
Rutherford frequently appears on BBC science programmes, on both radio and television. Since 2013, he has been the host of the programme Inside Science on BBC Radio 4. In 2012 he was featured on the series Horizon on BBC Two television in the documentary Playing God, which covered synthetic biology using the example of the "Spider Goat", a goat genetically modified to produce spider silk in its milk.