Sir James Cuthbert Smith FRS FMedSci (born 31 December 1954)[4] is an Emeritus Scientist[5] at the Francis Crick Institute, Honorary Fellow of Christ's College, Cambridge[6] and President of the Council at the Zoological Society of London.

[7][8][9][10][3][11] Smith was educated at Latymer Upper School[4] and graduated from the University of Cambridge with a Bachelor of Arts degree in Natural Sciences in 1976.

[3] He was awarded a PhD in 1979 by University College London (UCL) for research supervised by Lewis Wolpert at Middlesex Hospital Medical School.

[18] Smith's research has focused on how cells of the very early vertebrate embryo form the specialised tissues of muscle, skin, blood and bone.

[13] His discovery of a mesoderm-inducing factor secreted by a cell line and establishing its identity as activin transformed the study of induction in the early embryo.