Alistair Hetherington

Biography

He graduated from the University of St Andrews with a BSc in Botany in 1979 and remained there to carry out research leading to a PhD (1982) under the supervision of Prof Bob Crawford (Botany) and Dr Ian Hunter (Biochemistry) in the area of lipid metabolism under anoxic stress. After St Andrews He moved to the University of Edinburgh for two years where He carried out post-doctoral research with Prof Tony Trewavas FRS on calcium activated protein kinases. This appointment stimulated my interest in intracellular signalling and in 1984 I moved to the University of Lancaster as a “New Blood Lecturer”. At Lancaster He collaborated with Prof Terry Mansfield FRS who introduced me to guard cells, and as a result, investigating signal transduction in these cells has been the major focus of his research ever since. In 1994 He was appointed to a personal Chair in Plant Cell Physiology at Lancaster and twelve years later, in 2006, He was appointed to the Melville Wills Chair of Botany at the University of Bristol. He is currently Research Director for the Faculty of Science.

Research Interest

guard cell signalling, the control of stomatal development by environmental signals, sphingosine-based signalling, the role of calcium as an intracellular second messenger, the evolution of intracellular signalling systems, the evolution of stomata, improving crop water use efficiency, crop albedo bio-geoengineering.