Tony Michael, Ph.D.

I was born in the Pre-Cambrian period in Swansea, Wales, UK. I attended the University of Manchester Institute of Science and Technology and, after completing my PhD in 1987 on plant viral transcriptional promoters at the John Innes Institute, Norwich, UK, I spent nearly four years working at INRA, Versailles, France working on the "rol" oncogenes of Agrobacterium rhizogenes. I then spent a year 1991-1992 working on homeotic transcription factors at the John Innes Institute, Norwich, UK. In June, 1992 I started as a staff research scientist at the Institute of Food Research, Norwich, UK. In 1996, I spent four months working with Prof. Kazuei Igarashi on yeast polyamine transport in Chiba University on the east side of Tokyo Bay. I then returned to the Institute of Food Research in Norwich and continued as a PI there until March, 2010. In May 2010, I started as an Associate Professor in the Dept. of Pharmacology, UT Southwestern.

Undergraduate	Univ.of Manchester Institute of Sci & Technology (1983), Biochemistry
Graduate School	Univ. of East Anglia (john Innes Institute) (1988)

Featured Publications

Evolution of a novel lysine decarboxylase in siderophore biosynthesis.

Burrell M, Hanfrey CC, Kinch LN, Elliott KA, Michael AJ Mol. Microbiol. 2012 Aug

An alternative spermidine biosynthetic route is critical for growth of Campylobacter jejuni and is the dominant polyamine pathway in the human gut microbiota.

Hanfrey CC, Pearson BM, Hazeldine S, Lee J, Gaskin DJ, Woster PM, Phillips MA, Michael AJ The Journal of biological chemistry 2011 Oct

Molecular machines encoded by bacterially-derived multi-domain gene fusions that potentially synthesize, N-methylate and transfer long chain polyamines in diatoms.

Michael AJ FEBS Lett. 2011 Sep 585 17 2627-34

Independent evolutionary origins of functional polyamine biosynthetic enzyme fusions catalysing de novo diamine to triamine formation.

Green R, Hanfrey CC, Elliott KA, McCloskey DE, Wang X, Kanugula S, Pegg AE, Michael AJ Molecular microbiology 2011 Jul 1109-24

Evolution and multifarious horizontal transfer of an alternative biosynthetic pathway for the alternative polyamine sym-homospermidine

Shaw, F.L., Elliot, K.A., Kinch, L.N., Fuell, C., Phillips, M.A. and Michael, A.J. Journal of Biological Chemistry 2010 285 14711-14723

A profusion of uORF mechanisms in polyamine-responsive translational regulation

Ivanov, I. P., Atkins, J.F. and Michael, A.J. Nucleic Acids Research 2010 38 353-359

Evolution of substrate specificity within a diverse family of beta/alpha-barrel-fold basic amino acids: X-ray structure determination of enzymes with specificity for L-arginine and carboxynorspermidine

Deng, X., Lee, J., Michael, A.J., Tomchick, D.R., Goldsmith, E.J., Phillips, M.A. Journal of Biological Chemistry 2010 285 25708-19

Evolution and multiplicity of arginine decarboxylases in polyamine biosynthesis and essential role in Bacillus subtilis biofilm formation

Burrell, M, Hanfrey, C.C., Murray, E.J., Stanley-Wall, N. and Michael, A.J. Journal of Biological Chemistry 2010 285 39224-38

An alternative polyamine biosynthetic pathway is widespread in bacteria and essential for biofilm formation in Vibrio cholerae

Lee, J., Sperandio, V., Frantz, D.E., Longgood, J., Camilli, A., Phillips, M.A., Michael, A. J. Journal of Biological Chemistry 2009 284 9899-9907

A novel polyamine acyltransferase responsible for the accumulation of spermidine conjugates in Arabidopsis seed

Luo, J., Fuell, C., Parr, A., Hill. L., Bailey, P., Elliott, K., Fairhurst, S.A., Martin, C., Michael, A.J. The Plant Cell 2009 21 318-333