Mervyn Bibb obtained his PhD from the University of East Anglia (UEA) in 1977 working with Prof Sir David Hopwood FRS. He then worked as a postdoctoral fellow (1978-1982) with Prof Stanley Cohen at Stanford University before taking up a faculty position at the John Innes Centre, where he served as Head of the Department of Molecular Microbiology. Mervyn’s research focuses on antibiotic biosynthesis and its regulation in actinobacteria, which produce about two-thirds of all known antibiotics of microbial origin, many of which are used clinically. He has published 180 papers and presented the work of his group at over 70 international conferences. He is the recipient of the Lepetit Award, the Colworth Prize, the Charles Thom Award and the Norman Heatley Medal. He is an Honorary Professor at UEA, Imperial College London, the University of Lorraine and the Institute of Microbiology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing. He is also a Fellow of the Royal Society, the American Academy of Microbiology, the Royal Society of Chemistry and the Royal Society of Biology. The three will receive plaques from SIMB, presented at the Award Banquet on Thursday, July 28 to recognize this achievement.
Raj Boopathy, PhD
Dr. Raj Boopathy is an Alcee Fortier Distinguished Service Professor of biological sciences at the Nicholls State University, USA. He received the Jerry Ledet Foundation Endowed Professorship in Environmental Biology in 2002 and John Brady Endowed Professorship in 2012. In 2008, Dr. Raj Boopathy received the Nicholls State University’s Presidential Award for Teaching Excellence. He has more than 25 years of research experience in the area of bioremediation and bio-processing. His research involves bioremediation of hazardous chemicals including oil spills, biological treatment of wastewater, and bio-ethanol production. He has published 139 research papers in peer- reviewed journals and 12 book chapters. His research work has been cited more than 4000 times. Dr.Raj Boopathy reviewed research grants for National Science Foundation, Department of Defense, US Environmental Protection Agency, Department of Energy, and numerous private agencies and foreign governments including South Africa, Switzerland, Indonesia, and India. He is the editor of International journal of Biodeteriortion and Biodegradation (IBB). He is the Associate Editor of the Journal, Bioresource Technology and on the Editorial Board of various International journals. Dr. Raj Boopathy received Fulbright scholarship and spent six months teaching and conducting research at the Institute of Technology (ITB) in Bandung, Indonesia in 2007. He also received European Union-US biotechnology Fellowship and Leverhulme commonwealth fellowship. He is the Fellow of International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry (IUPAC) and the International Forum on Bioprocessing (IFBioP).
Kevin Reynolds, PhD
Kevin Reynolds is a Professor of Chemistry and the Vice President for Finance and Administration at Portland State University. He previously held academic rank positions at Virginia Commonwealth University and the University of Maryland, Baltimore. He did his postdoctoral research at the University of Washington, Seattle. Dr. Reynolds academic qualifications, a B.S. (1984) and a Ph.D. (1987) in Chemistry (1987), were awarded by the University of Southampton, England. Dr. Reynolds has over 27 years of research. His work has delineated pathways which provide precursors for microbial secondary metabolic pathways, provided a detailed biochemical and genetic understanding of the assembly of a wide array of complex polyketide type natural products, and has provided access to novel antibiotic structures. His work has also covered an array of microbial and parasitic fatty acid biosynthetic processes and exploitation of these either as a new target for new drug discovery, or in olefin production. More recently he has been working on the design, synthesis and evaluation of new antimalarial agents based on the tambjamine and prodiginine scaffolds. Dr. Reynolds has published over 115 peer-reviewed publications (1987-2015) and his research work has been continuously funded by the US Federal government since 1991. Dr. Reynolds was a Board member of the Society for Industrial Microbiology (2009-2011) and the Program Chair for the Annual Meeting (2003). He was also a program co-chair and session chair at other annual meetings (2000, 2003-2009).
