Dr Ramsay has wide-ranging interests in bacterial gene regulation and evolution.

An overarching theme to his research is the evolution of bacteria through horizontal gene transfer and the biology of the mobile genetic elements that facilitate horizontal gene transfer.

Dr Ramsay carried out his PhD in 2004-2008 at the University of Otago with Prof. Clive Ronson. He was then a University of Cambridge Herchel Smith Postdoctoral Fellow from 2008-2011 and a Health Sciences Career Development Fellow at the University of Otago until 2013. Dr Ramsay's investigations explore the impacts of mobile genetic elements in both health related and agricultural contexts. In 2018 Dr Ramsay was awarded an ARC Future Fellowship and he is currently an Associate Professor at Curtin University in the Curtin Medical School and Curtin Health Innovation Research Institute.