Professor Gillian Taylor

Professor Gillian Taylor
Professor in Forensic Science, Northumbria University

About

Professor Gillian Taylor is an analytical chemist who uses chromatography and mass spectrometry, techniques that separate and identify the individual chemicals in a sample, to answer questions about the past and about public health. Her career began in stable isotope analysis, including postdoctoral research at the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology in Leipzig. Before joining Northumbria University, she was Associate Professor (Research and Innovation) at Teesside University, where she worked from 2010. She now leads research across forensic science, archaeological science and drug analysis, collaborating with archaeologists, microbiologists, environmental scientists and public health researchers. 

Archaeology and climate change

A central strand of Professor Taylor’s research explores why some materials survive in the ground for thousands of years while others do not. She studies leather, bone, textiles and soil from Roman sites including Vindolanda and Magna in Northumberland, combining chemical, elemental and microbial analysis to understand how these objects break down, a process known as diagenesis. Her findings show that buried leather can deteriorate surprisingly quickly when conditions change, and that the waterlogged, oxygen-poor soils that have protected Roman remains are vulnerable to a warming climate. This work helps heritage managers decide how sites should be monitored, protected and recorded. The same approaches support forensic science, where she investigates how bone changes when it is buried or burned, and how decomposition alters soil and the microbes living in it.

Drug identification and public health

Professor Taylor also develops methods to identify illicit and novel psychoactive substances, which often appear faster than the tools used to detect them. Her recent work includes research on synthetic cannabinoids found in e-cigarettes seized from English schools, and on field-portable technology that can identify drugs quickly outside the laboratory by reading their spectroscopic fingerprints with deep learning. She has also contributed to peer research with people who use street tablets in areas heavily affected by drug-related harm. By working alongside chemists, clinicians and public health researchers, she aims to give services and communities faster, more reliable information about what people are really taking.

• Please visit the Pure Research Information Portal for further information
• Peer research with populations of people who use street tablets in areas over-represented by drug-related harms in the UK: a case study, Poulter, H., Silva, P., Moore, H., Kesten, J., MacKinnon, M., Taylor, G. 2 Feb 2026, In: Harm Reduction Journal
• Bone Diagenesis and Extremes of Preservation in Forensic Science, Williams, R., Thompson, T., Orr, C., Taylor, G. 24 Jan 2025, In: Humans
• Determining the impact of elemental composition on the long-term survival of vegetable-tanned leather in archaeological environments, Halldórsdóttir, H., Williams, R., Greene, E., Lenis, V., Taylor, G. 1 Oct 2025, In: Archaeometry
• Field-Portable Technology for Illicit Drug Discrimination via Deep Learning of Hybridized Reflectance/Fluorescence Spectroscopic Fingerprints, Power, A., Gardner, M., Andrews, R., Cozier, G., Kumar, R., Freeman, T., Blagbrough, I., Sunderland, P., Scott, J., Frinculescu, A., Shine, T., Taylor, G., Norman, C., Ménard, H., Daéid, N., Sutcliffe, O., Husbands, S., Bowman, R., Haines, T., Pudney, C. 20 May 2025, In: Analytical Chemistry
• Synthetic cannabinoids in e-cigarettes seized from English schools, Cozier, G., Gardner, M., Craft, S., Skumlien, M., Spicer, J., Andrews, R., Power, A., Haines, T., Bowman, R., Manley, A., Sunderland, P., Sutcliffe, O., Husbands, S., Hines, L., Taylor, G., Freeman, T., Scott, J., Pudney, C. 1 Oct 2025, In: Addiction

• Please visit the Pure Research Information Portal for further information
• Peer research with populations of people who use street tablets in areas over-represented by drug-related harms in the UK: a case study, Poulter, H., Silva, P., Moore, H., Kesten, J., MacKinnon, M., Taylor, G. 2 Feb 2026, In: Harm Reduction Journal
• A Study on Recirculating Process Water from Hydrothermal Carbonisation of Spent Brewing Grains: Impact on Hydrochar Characterisation and Process Water Composition, Abdalqadir, M., Babelhadj, M., Bentchikou, M., Qadir, D., Hughes, D., Taylor, G., Ahmad, F., Suleman, H., Aboelazayem, O. 12 Jun 2025, In: European Biomass Conference and Exhibition Proceedings
• Biobased Bitumen Binder through Hydrothermal Liquefaction of Waste Biomass: Impact of Different Feedstock and Solvents, Omairey, E., Omonjade, E., Nurie, M., Adelabu, I., Cheah, K., Howarth, J., Abdy, C., Taylor, G., Abdalqadir, M., Hughes, D., Aboelazayem, O. 12 Jun 2025, In: European Biomass Conference and Exhibition Proceedings
• Bone Diagenesis and Extremes of Preservation in Forensic Science, Williams, R., Thompson, T., Orr, C., Taylor, G. 23 Jan 2025, In: Humans
• Characterising the degradation of leather through the decades: Evidence from 50 years of excavations at Vindolanda Roman fort, Taylor, G., Birley, B., Birley, A., Greene, E. 15 Sep 2025, Wet Organic Archaeological Materials 2025: Proceedings of the 16th Conference of the ICOM-CC Wet Organic Archaeological Materials Working Group, Göteborg, 2025, Paris, France, ICOM
• Co-processing of Waste Cooking Oil and Hemp-shives for an Intensified Production of Advanced Biodiesel, Abdalqaqdir, M., Ozurumba, L., Akpah, G., Hughes, D., Taylor, G., Aboelazayem, O. 12 Jun 2025, In: European Biomass Conference and Exhibition Proceedings
• Determining the impact of elemental composition on the long-term survival of vegetable-tanned leather in archaeological environments, Halldórsdóttir, H., Williams, R., Greene, E., Lenis, V., Taylor, G. 1 Oct 2025, In: Archaeometry
• Field-Portable Technology for Illicit Drug Discrimination via Deep Learning of Hybridized Reflectance/Fluorescence Spectroscopic Fingerprints, Power, A., Gardner, M., Andrews, R., Cozier, G., Kumar, R., Freeman, T., Blagbrough, I., Sunderland, P., Scott, J., Frinculescu, A., Shine, T., Taylor, G., Norman, C., Ménard, H., Daéid, N., Sutcliffe, O., Husbands, S., Bowman, R., Haines, T., Pudney, C. 20 May 2025, In: Analytical Chemistry
• Organic residue analysis of pottery residues, Cramp, L., Taylor, G., Evershed, R., Craig, O. 15 Aug 2025, Cladh Hallan: Roundhouses and the Dead in the Hebridean Bronze Age and Iron Age, Oxford, UK, Oxbow Books
• Spent Brewing Grains into Engineered Hydrochar-based Adsorbent for Direct Air Carbon Capture, Babelhadj, M., Qadir, D., Abdalqaqdir, M., Adeoye, A., Ayansina, F., Basheer, A., Bentchikou, M., Taylor, G., Masek, O., Ahmad, F., Aboelazayem, O., Suleman, H. 12 Jun 2025, In: European Biomass Conference and Exhibition Proceedings

• PhD February 21 2006
• Fellow of the Higher Education Academy