The Keilin Memorial Lecture will be presented to Professor A. W. Rutherford in 2026. Bill is a field leader in photosynthetic bioenergetics, focusing on photochemical reaction centres and water oxidation. Evolutionary thinking gave him an edge when interpreting ambiguous biophysical data. He did Biochemistry at the University of Liverpool, a PhD at University College London, post-doctoral work at the University of Illinois, Riken (Saitama) and CEA-Saclay, before joining the CNRS. In 2011, he moved to Imperial College London. Bill followed his own interests, producing discoveries and concepts central to the field. These include: i) the Photosystem 2 (PS2) chlorophyll triplet responsible for singlet oxygen-induced photodamage that limits plant growth, ii) the PS2 primary electron donor, ChlD1; iii) the mechanism of PS2 herbicides (photo-oxidative stress), iv) the origin and mechanism PS2 thermoluminescence, v) the role of bicarbonate in PS2 (protection by redox tuning).

In 2012, Bill introduced the concept that redox tuning is required for life in O2, explaining anomalies in photosynthetic and non-photosynthetic bioenergetics. This interest in energy accounting opened new research directions. In 2018 his team showed long-wavelength photochemistry in chlorophyll-f-containing photosystems: a major surprise. This work i) changed the understanding of energy limitations in photosynthesis, ii) linked the number/colour/location of the light-collecting chlorophylls to the bioenergetics of charge separation, iii) provided design concepts for more efficient photosynthesis; and iv) launched a new and active field.

Bill said: “Bioenergetics is the heart of biochemistry. Photosynthetic bioenergetics is the energy input for the biosphere, and it literally changed the planet. It is a privilege to contribute to the understanding of how it works and it is an honour to be on the list of Keilin awardees that includes the names of researchers who have been variously my heroes or friends (and sometimes both) during my career.”

The 2024 Keilin Memorial Lecture will be presented to Professor Michael Duchen. Michael was born in South Africa, moving to the UK as a child. He studied Physiology and Medicine at Merton College, Oxford and was fortunate to win a summer scholarship at the Weizman Institute with Prof Roy Caplan where he was introduced to basic principles of bioenergetics. He completed his medical training at St George's Hospital Medical School in London where he then worked as a junior hospital doctor in a range of specialties, including a period working at St Barnabas Hospital, a rural hospital in the Transkei, in South Africa.

After completing the MRCP, he moved to the UCL Department of Physiology to embark on a PhD, supervised by Prof Tim Biscoe. He has stayed at UCL ever since – in fact he still occupies the ‘Starling’ lab in which he did his PhD work, although substantially refurbished! – first as a Royal Society University Research Fellow, then as Reader and Professor.

His early research focused on neurotransmitter receptor biology, but he became interested in mitochondrial bioenergetics first through studies of oxygen sensing in the carotid body, later becoming fascinated by mitochondrial cell biology, in the dialogue between cell signalling pathways and mitochondria, and in the roles of mitochondrial dysfunction in disease, which is where work in the lab is now mostly focused.

On winning the Keilin Memorial Lecture for 2024, Michael said: "I have been incredibly lucky to have a succession of really wonderful young people working with me over the years who have all contributed to this achievement. The award of the Keilin Lecture recognises and validates years of work by that team who I am fortunate to represent. This validation is a great encouragement to pursue new ideas in mitochondrial cell biology with an ambition to understand mechanisms of disease. It would be immensely satisfying for me to complete the circle, applying principles we have learned over many years of work in basic mitochondrial cell biology to identify treatment strategies for people with otherwise intractable clinical problems that I originally encountered as a young doctor. This is my ultimate ambition."

Michael presented his Award lecture at Membrane contact sites in cellular homeostasis on 24 September 2024.

The 2020 Keilin Memorial Lecture was awarded to Professor Judy Hirst of MRC Mitochondrial Biology Unit, UK.

Judy’s research has made pivotal contributions to understanding energy conversion in complex redox enzymes: how they capture the energy released by a redox reaction to power proton translocation across a membrane, or catalyse the interconversion of chemical bond energy and electrical potential. She is known particularly for her work on mammalian respiratory complex I (NADH: ubiquinone oxidoreductase), an energy-transducing, mitochondrial redox enzyme of fundamental and medical importance, and for solving its structure by electron cryomicroscopy. Judy was elected as a Fellow of the Royal Society in 2018.

Judy said: “I am delighted to have been selected to receive the Keilin Memorial Lecture Award. I feel this award recognizes the importance of taking on challenging long-term research projects at the boundaries of basic and biomedical science, and have been fortunate to have been supported by The Medical Research Council throughout – as well as by a team of talented and enthusiastic students and postdocs.”

Judy presented her Award lecture on Monday 7 December 2020 during ‘Low molecular weight thiols: lessons learned and new perspectives’ online conference.

The 2018 Keilin Memorial Lecture was presented to Neil Hunter, who holds the Krebs Chair of Biochemistry at the University of Sheffield. Neil’s research on energy and electron transfers in microbial photosynthesis recently culminated in a complete structural and functional description of an energy-transducing membrane, from collecting sunlight to charge separation, quinone migration, generation of a proton gradient, and finally catalysis by the ATP synthase. Neil has also made major contributions to understanding the biogenesis of the haem, bacteriochlorophyll, chlorophyll and carotenoid cofactors, and their assembly into energy, electron and proton transfer complexes…

Read Neil's article published in the Biochemical Journal - Dissecting the cytochrome c2–reaction centre interaction in bacterial photosynthesis using single molecule force spectroscopy.

Of winning the Keilin Memorial Lectureship, Neil said “I am delighted and honoured to be the recipient of the Keilin Medal and Lecture, particularly because I join a list of eminent recipients of this award. I would like to thank past and present members of my research group and my many collaborators for their contributions over the last thirty three years.” 

Neil presented his award lecture at the 84th Harden Conference: Single- molecule bacteriology on 9-12 September 2018 at Lady Margaret Hall, Oxford, UK.

The Keilin Memorial Lecture in 2016 was presented to Michael Murphy (MRC MBU, Cambridge, UK) for his contribution to research in basic and applied bioenergetics. Michael has produced influential discoveries in the last 20 years showing the detailed mechanisms of mitochondrial oxidant production and has pioneered translational redox bioenergetics.

Michael Murphy gave his award lecture at the 79th Harden Conference: Oxygen Evolution and Reduction – Common Principles, Grauer Bär, Innsbruck, Austria, 16—20 April 2016.

Read Michael's article published in Biochemical Society Transactions - Understanding and preventing mitochondrial oxidative damage.