Since my formal retirement in 2004 I have been a John Innes Foundation Emeritus Fellow. Although I no longer have a laboratory-based group, I have been able to continue my long-term interest in the developmental biology of the model organism Streptomyces coelicolor, including its significance for antibiotic production. Recent topics have been: the redox-sensitive regulatory WhiB-like proteins universal among, but confined to, actinobacteria; the developmental significance of the rare TTA codon; the importance of extracellular biology in development and antibiotic production; and the elucidation of the subcellular roles, organisation and dynamics of cytoskeletal and related elements. This has been facilitated by continued collaborations with laboratories elsewhere, including, in China, Prof. H. Tan (Institute of Microbiology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing) and Prof Z. X. Deng and Dr M. Tao (Huazhong Agricultural University, Wuhan); in Korea, Prof. K.J. Lee (Seoul National University); in Poland, Prof. J. Zakrzewska-Czerwinska and Dr D. Jakimowicz); in Hungary, Dr. S. Biro (University of Debrecen); in the USA, Dr W. Bishai (Johns Hopkins University); in the Netherlands, Dr G. van Wezel (Leiden University) and Dr E. Takano (University of Groeningen); and in the UK, Prof. G. Challis (Warwick University).

With the rapid growth in genome sequence information available for streptomycetes and other actinobacteria, I have also become involved in comparative and evolutionary genomics, with considerable bioinformatics help from Dr Govind Chandra of this department, and collaborations in the USA (Prof. R. Loria, Cornell University), Israel (Dr C. Greenblatt, Hebrew University, Jerusalem), Italy (Dr. Marco Ventura, University of Parma) and the UK (Prof. A. C. Ward, Newcastle University).

John Innes Centre, Norwich Research Park, Colney, Norwich NR4 7UH, UK

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