Mervyn Bibb

Mervyn Bibb
Bibb in 2015
Born	(1952-05-27)27 May 1952 Cannock, UK
Nationality	English
Alma mater	University of East Anglia
Awards	Lepetit Award Colworth Prize Charles Thom Award Norman Heatley Medal Fellow of the Royal Society Docteur Honoris Causa, Université de Lorraine, Nancy, France Emeritus Fellow of the Society for Industrial Microbiology and Biotechnology David Gottlieb Medal
Scientific career
Fields	Molecular microbiology Actinomycetes Antibiotic biosynthesis Gene regulation[1]
Institutions	John Innes Centre Stanford University [2] [3]
Doctoral advisor	Professor Sir David Hopwood FRS
Other academic advisors	Professor Stanley N Cohen

Mervyn Bibb FRS is an Emeritus Fellow at the John Innes Centre, Norwich, UK.

Mervyn Bibb was born in Cannock, Staffordshire and brought up in the rural village of Wedges Mills.  He was educated at Walhouse Junior School in Cannock followed by Cannock Grammar School.  He received his BSc degree in Genetics and Developmental Biology (First Class Honours) in 1974 from the University of East Anglia (UEA). He carried out his PhD research on the genetics of the medically and agriculturally important model bacterium Streptomyces coelicolor in the Department of Genetics at the then John Innes Institute, Norwich under the supervision of Professor Sir David Hopwood FRS, receiving his degree in 1978.  A year’s postdoctoral study in the same laboratory resulted in the first genetic transformation of Streptomyces species.  He then pursued postdoctoral work for four years in Stanford University School of Medicine in Palo Alto, California, USA under the guidance of Professor Stanley N Cohen, where he carried out the first gene cloning experiments in Streptomyces species.

In 1982 he returned to the John Innes Institute (now John Innes Centre, JIC) as a Group Leader and later became Head of the Department of Molecular Microbiology.

His research focused on understanding antibiotic production and its regulation in actinomycetes, the larger family to which Streptomyces species belong and the major source of clinically useful antibiotics.  The resulting knowledge is used not only to understand how these complex molecules are made, but also to engineer the producing organisms to achieve increases in productivity and to make potentially improved derivatives. Genome sequencing has revealed that actinomycetes have the potential to produce many more natural products than previously thought, many with potential applications in medicine and agriculture; work in his group also focused on the activation of these silent biosynthetic gene clusters and the characterisation of their products. Work in his group led to the formation of two JIC spin-out companies, Novacta Biosystems and Procarta Biosystems.  He has published over 190 papers (H index = 87 on 14-08-2025).

Since 2007, he has taught on, and more recently been the lead organiser of, a highly popular biennial Summer School in Applied Molecular Microbiology held in Dubrovnik, Croatia.

He is an Emeritus Fellow at JIC, and an Honorary Professor at UEA, the Institute of Microbiology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, and Wuhan University. He is also a Fellow of the Royal Society, the American Academy of Microbiology, and the Society for Industrial Microbiology and Biotechnology (Emeritus).  He has been the recipient of the Lepetit Award, the Colworth Prize, the Charles Thom Award, the Heatley Prize and Medal, and the David Gottlieb Medal. In 2015 he was bestowed as Docteur Honoris Causa, by the Université de Lorraine, Nancy, France for his scientific achievements.

He married Maureen (née Lynch) in 1978; they have two daughters – Eleana and Catherine. Courtesy of Eleana and Toby, they have three grandchildren: Sophia, Lillia and Xavier.