Professor Mohamed Gamal Abdelmonem is Chair of Architecture and the Founding Director Research at the Department of Architecture and the Built Environment, at the University of York. He is the Founding Director of the multi-award winning the Centre for Architecture, Urbanism and Global Heritage since 2017. In his previous roles, Gamal was a Chair in Architecture at Nottingham Trent University, where he led the Global Heritage Research Theme, the first Research Peak on Cultural Heritage, and the Virtual Heritage Research Centre (HeritageCAVE). He was also the BA Course Lead at Queen's University Belfast and taught at Sheffield University's School of Architecture.

Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts and Patron of the Home Renaissance Foundation, Gamal is multiple award winner and the recipient of The Queen’s Anniversary Prize (2022), UK’s highest national award for research, recipient of NTU Research Excellence Award (2020), the Jeffrey Cook Award (2014), and shortlisted for the prestigious Newton Prize (2020). Gamal’s research has been featured as the REF2021 Best Practice Impact Case Study across the Architecture and the Built Environment in the UK National Review (2023).

Professor Abdelmonem research links architecture to key fields of enquiries in heritage, anthrology, history and theory, and virtual technology. His work focused on architectural history, architectural and urban heritage, architecture of home, socio-spatial practices of urban communities, museums of the future, virtual heritage technologies, and post-conflict cities. He sits on strategic research & funding panels in the United Kingdom (UKRI), the European Union (Horizon2020 & Horizon Europe) and joint panels in Germany, Portugal and Saudi Arabia. Gamal’s work has informed governments, international organisations, and featured in leading academic journals and government policies.  His recent books include ‘Peripheries: Edge Conditions in Architecture’ (2012), ‘Portrush: Towards an Architecture for the North Irish Coast’ (2013); ‘The Architecture of Home in Cairo’ (2016), and “Architecture, Space and Memory of Resurrection in Northern Ireland” (2019); and ‘People, Care and Work in the Home’ (2020).