Dr Emma Hilton is a developmental biologist at the University of Manchester, where her research has focused on developmental genetics and human genetic disease. She earned her PhD at the University of Warwick, studying early events in vertebrate embryonic development.

Hilton became a prominent public voice in debates over sex and gender after writing about the biological basis of sex differences in athletic performance. She is the co-author, with sports scientist Tommy Lundberg, of an influential review examining testosterone suppression and retained performance advantages in transgender women. Her position is that male puberty produces enduring advantages in strength, speed, power and body composition that hormone treatment cannot reliably eliminate, and that female sporting categories therefore need to be defined by sex rather than gend ...