Citation | Timmis is distinguished for early contributions to understanding plasmid replication and, especially, for a career-long string of ' firsts ' in metabolic pathway engineering. He discovered the pervasive ' minimal replicon ' concept for bacterial plasmids, and the paradigm of negative control of plasmid copy number. He cloned and characterised entire bacterial metabolic pathways for the first time, isloated novel regulators for gene expression, and designed novel catabolic pathways from first principles, notably for bioremediation of environmental pollutants. He discovered complex microbe-clay mineral associations in the soil and used a microbial biofilm community to develop a prize-winning strategy for removing mercury from waste streams. |