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]
![](../I/Colin_Hughes%252C_microbiologist.png.webp)
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
- Department of Pathology, University of Cambridge
- Fellows of Trinity College Cambridge
- Fellows, The Learned Society of Wales
- Hughes, C.; Meynell, G. G. (1974). "High Frequency of Antibiotic-Resistant Enterobacteria in the River Stour, Kent". The Lancet. 304 (7878): 451–453. doi:10.1016/S0140-6736(74)91829-7. PMID 4136769.
- Hughes, Colin; Meynell, G. G. (1977). "Rapid screening for plasmid DNA". Molecular and General Genetics MGG. 151 (2): 175–179. doi:10.1007/BF00338692. PMID 876023. S2CID 29646925.
- Issartel, Jean-Paul; Koronakis, Vassilis; Hughes, Colin (1991). "Activation of Escherichia coli prohaemolysin to the mature toxin by acyl carrier protein-dependent fatty acylation". Nature. 351 (6329): 759–761. doi:10.1038/351759a0. PMID 2062368. S2CID 4265345.
- Stanley, Peter; Packman, Len C.; Koronakis, Vassilis; Hughes, Colin (1994). "Fatty Acylation of Two Internal Lysine Residues Required for the Toxic Activity of Escherichia coli Hemolysin". Science. 266 (5193): 1992–1996. doi:10.1126/science.7801126. PMID 7801126.
- Thanabalu, T.; Koronakis, E.; Hughes, C.; Koronakis, V. (1998). "Substrate-induced assembly of a contiguous channel for protein export from E.coli: Reversible bridging of an inner-membrane translocase to an outer membrane exit pore". The EMBO Journal. 17 (22): 6487–6496. doi:10.1093/emboj/17.22.6487. PMC 1170996. PMID 9822594.
- Greene, Nicholas P.; Crow, Allister; Hughes, Colin; Koronakis, Vassilis (2015). "Structure of a bacterial toxin-activating acyltransferase". Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. 112 (23): E3058-66. doi:10.1073/pnas.1503832112. PMC 4466738. PMID 26016525.
- Thomas, Joanne; Stafford, Graham P.; Hughes, Colin (2004). "Docking of cytosolic chaperone-substrate complexes at the membrane ATPase during flagellar type III protein export". Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. 101 (11): 3945–3950. doi:10.1073/pnas.0307223101. PMC 374349. PMID 15001708.
- Evans, Lewis D. B.; Stafford, Graham P.; Ahmed, Sangita; Fraser, Gillian M.; Hughes, Colin (2006). "An escort mechanism for cycling of export chaperones during flagellum assembly". Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. 103 (46): 17474–17479. doi:10.1073/pnas.0605197103. PMC 1859953. PMID 17088562.
- Evans, Lewis D. B.; Poulter, Simon; Terentjev, Eugene M.; Hughes, Colin; Fraser, Gillian M. (2013). "A chain mechanism for flagellum growth". Nature. 504 (7479): 287–290. doi:10.1038/nature12682. PMC 3864836. PMID 24213633.
- Koronakis, Vassilis; Sharff, Andrew; Koronakis, Eva; Luisi, Ben; Hughes, Colin (2000). "Crystal structure of the bacterial membrane protein TolC central to multidrug efflux and protein export". Nature. 405 (6789): 914–919. doi:10.1038/35016007. PMID 10879525. S2CID 4412566.
- Andersen, Christian; Koronakis, Eva; Bokma, Evert; Eswaran, Jeyanthy; Humphreys, Daniel; Hughes, Colin; Koronakis, Vassilis (2002). "Transition to the open state of the TolC periplasmic tunnel entrance". Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. 99 (17): 11103–11108. doi:10.1073/pnas.162039399. PMC 123217. PMID 12163644.
- Higgins, Matthew K.; Bokma, Evert; Koronakis, Eva; Hughes, Colin; Koronakis, Vassilis (2004). "Structure of the periplasmic component of a bacterial drug efflux pump". Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. 101 (27): 9994–9999. doi:10.1073/pnas.0400375101. PMC 454203. PMID 15226509.
- Lobedanz, Sune; Bokma, Evert; Symmons, Martyn F.; Koronakis, Eva; Hughes, Colin; Koronakis, Vassilis (2007). "A periplasmic coiled-coil interface underlying TolC recruitment and the assembly of bacterial drug efflux pumps". Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. 104 (11): 4612–4617. doi:10.1073/pnas.0610160104. PMC 1838649. PMID 17360572.
- Symmons, Martyn F.; Bokma, Evert; Koronakis, Eva; Hughes, Colin; Koronakis, Vassilis (2009). "The assembled structure of a complete tripartite bacterial multidrug efflux pump". Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. 106 (17): 7173–7178. doi:10.1073/pnas.0900693106. PMC 2678420. PMID 19342493.
- Pei, Xue-Yuan; Hinchliffe, Philip; Symmons, Martyn F.; Koronakis, Eva; Benz, Roland; Hughes, Colin; Koronakis, Vassilis (2011). "Structures of sequential open states in a symmetrical opening transition of the TolC exit duct". Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. 108 (5): 2112–2117. doi:10.1073/pnas.1012588108. PMC 3033246. PMID 21245342.
- Research articles available on Google Scholar, including h-index and i-10 index.