Benjamin Simons is the EP Abraham Royal Society Research Professor at the University of Cambridge. He is widely recognized for his innovative, multidisciplinary, contributions to the stem cell field, which have shaped and transformed our understanding of the cellular mechanisms that underpin the development, maintenance and regeneration of renewing tissues. His pioneering statistical and mathematical methods have revealed the dynamics and fate behaviour of stem and progenitor cell populations in multiple tissue types in both normal and perturbed states. As well as overturning prevailing models, these studies have emphasized the role of stochastic renewal programmes, fate priming and cell state flexibility, challenging the nature of stem cell identity and framing directed questions into the molecular regulation of cell fate.