Citation | Keith Chater is distinguished for pioneering studies of differentiation in the mycelial, multicellular bacterium Streptomyces coelicolor. He has analysed the development of the reproductive phase of the colony - origin of the aerial mycelium and its metamorphosis into spores - by a powerful combination of "classical" and molecular genetics. For the latter he developed the temperate bacteriophage phiC31 into versatile vectors for isolation and functional analysis of genes responsible for developmental switches. One, whiG (coding for a developmentally-involved RNA polymerase sigma factor) acts at the transcriptional level. Another, bldA (for a tRNA), translates a rare codon (UUA) that appears to be confined to a small subset of genes required for differentiation; this translational regulation represents a completely novel discovery. He was also a pioneer in analysing gene clusters for antibiotic biosynthesis - co-ordinated with morphological differentiation - developing an imaginative "mutational cloning" procedure for the purpose. The hallmark of Keith Chater's work is a rigour of scientific deduction, coupled with a most imaginative design of experiments and their interpretation. He is one of the most gifted British bacterial geneticists of his generation. |