Colin Hughes (microbiologist)

Colin Hughes PhD ScD FLSW (born 14 March 1953) is a British microbiologist who has worked in the areas of bacterial virulence, motility and antibiotic resistance. He is Emeritus Professor of Microbiology at the University of Cambridge, Fellow of Trinity College Cambridge, and Fellow of the Learned Society of Wales.[1][2][3]

Professor Colin Hughes

Early life and education

Hughes was born and raised in North Wales. His parents were May Hughes (née Roberts) and Joseph Hughes, a textile worker. He was educated at Holywell Grammar School, which during his time there changed to the comprehensive school Holywell High School. He studied Natural Sciences at the University of Kent, Canterbury (1971-74), where, from 1974 to 1977, he also undertook research on plasmid-bearing enterobacteria for a PhD under the supervision of Professor G.G.Meynell.[4][5]

Academic career

He trained in three post-doctoral posts: at the Sandoz Research Institute Vienna (1977-80), at the University of Würzburg with Professor Werner Goebel (1980-83), and at the Smith Kline Research Institute in Philadelphia (1884). In 1985 he became Lecturer in Microbiology at the University of Cambridge Department of Pathology where he established research into the molecular biology of pathogenic bacteria. His subsequent work focused on cellular mechanisms underlying toxin biogenesis and export,[6][7][8][9] flagellum assembly[10][11][12]and multidrug resistance.[13][14][15][16][17][18] He has published over 120 research articles, listed on Google Scholar.[19]

He was awarded a Readership in Microbiology in 1996 and in 2001 was promoted to Professor of Microbiology. In 2000 he received the Doctor of Science degree from the University of Cambridge. He was elected Fellow of Trinity College, Cambridge in 1997, and in 2012 he became Fellow of the Learned Society of Wales (FLSW).

From 1985 to 2018 Hughes taught the University's Natural, Medical and Veterinary Science students in the Department of Pathology, where he became Director of Teaching (2011-17), and he was Director of Studies in Medical Sciences at Trinity College, Cambridge from 1997 to 2017. He was Head of the Department of Pathology's Division of Microbiology and Parasitology from 1998 to 2017, and Deputy Head of the Department from 2011 to 2017.

References
  1. Department of Pathology, University of Cambridge
  2. Fellows of Trinity College Cambridge
  3. Fellows, The Learned Society of Wales
  4. Hughes C, Meynell GG (1974) High frequency of antibiotic resistant enterobacteria. Lancet ii:451-453
  5. Hughes C, Meynell GG (1977) Rapid screening for plasmid DNA. Molecular and General Genetics 151:175-179
  6. Issartel et al (1991) Activation of Escherichia coli prohaemolysin to the mature toxin by acyl carrier protein-dependent fatty acylation. Nature 351:759-761
  7. Stanley et al (1994) Fatty acylation of two internal lysine residues required for the toxic activity of Escherichia coli hemolysin. Science 266:1992-1996
  8. Thanabalu et al (2000) Substrate-induced assembly of a contiguous channel for protein export from E.coli. EMBO J 17:6487-6496
  9. Greene et al (2015) Structure of bacterial toxin-activating acyltransferase. Proc Natl Acad Sci (USA) 112:E3058-3066
  10. Thomas et al (2004) Docking of chaperone-substrate complexes at the membrane ATPase during flagellar type III protein export. Proc Natl Acad Sci (USA) 101:3945-3950
  11. Evans et al (2006) An escort mechanism for cycling export chaperones. Proc Natl Acad Sci (USA) 103:17474-17479
  12. Evans et al (2013) A chain mechanism for flagellum growth. Nature 504:287-290
  13. Koronakis et al (2000) Crystal structure of ToIC central to multidrug efflux and protein export. Nature 405:914-919
  14. Andersen et al (2002) Transition to the open state of the ToIC periplasmic tunnel entrance. Proc Natl Acad Sci (USA) 99:11103-11108
  15. Higgins et al (2004) Structure of the periplasmic component of a bacterial efflux pump. Proc Natl Acad Sci (USA)101:9994-9999,
  16. Lobedanz et al (2007) A coiled-coil interface underlying ToIC recruitment and pump assembly. Proc Natl Acad Sci (USA) 104:4612-4617
  17. Symmons et al (2009)The assembled structure of a tripartite multidrug efflux pump. Proc Natl Acad Sci (USA) 106:7173-7178
  18. Pei et al (2011) Structures of sequential open states in a symmetrical transition of the ToIC exit duct. Proc Natl Acad Sci (USA) 108:2112-2117
  19. Research articles available on Google Scholar, including h-index and i-10 index.
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