Author Biography
Michael T. Madigan received his B.S. in Biology and Education from Wisconsin State University-Stevens Point (1971) and his M.S. (1974) and Ph.D. (1976) in Bacteriology from the University of Wisconsin-Madison. His graduate research was on the hot spring bacterium Chloroflexus in the laboratory of Thomas Brock. Following a three-year postdoctoral at Indiana University, Mike moved to Southern Illinois University-Carbondale, where he taught introductory microbiology and bacterial diversity as a professor of microbiology for 33 years. In 1988 Mike was selected as the Outstanding Teacher in the College of Science and in 1993, the Outstanding Researcher. In 2001 he received the SIUC Outstanding Scholar Award. In 2003 he received the Carski Award for Distinguished Undergraduate Teaching from the American Society for Microbiology, and he is an elected Fellow of the American Academy of Microbiology. Mike's research is focused on bacteria that inhabit extreme environments, and for the past 15 years he has studied Antarctic microbiology. In addition to research papers, he has edited a major treatise on phototrophic bacteria and served for 10 years as chief editor of the journal Archives of Microbiology. He currently serves on the editorial board of the journals Environmental Microbiology and Antonie van Leeuwenhoek. Mike's nonscientific interests include forestry, reading, and caring for his dogs and horses. He lives on a quiet lake with his wife, Nancy, four shelter dogs (Gaino, Pepto, Peanut, and Merry), and three horses (Eddie, Gwen, and Festus). John M. Martinko received his B.S. in Biology from The Cleveland State University. He then worked at Case Western Reserve University, conducting research on the serology and epidemiology of Streptococcus pyogenes. His doctoral work at the State University of New York at Buffalo investigated antibody specificity and antibody idiotypes. As a postdoctoral fellow, he worked at Albert Einstein College of Medicine in New York on the structure of major histocompatibility complex proteins. Since 1981, he has been in the Department of Microbiology at Southern Illinois University Carbondale where he was Associate Professor and Chair, and Director of the Molecular Biology, Microbiology, and Biochemistry Graduate Program. His research interests centered on the structure- function relationships of immune system proteins, including immunoglobulins, T cell receptors, and major histocompatibility proteins. His teaching interests include an advanced course in immunology as well as immunology and inflammation instruction to medical students. For his educational efforts, he won the 2007 Southern Illinois University Outstanding Teaching Award. He has been active in a number of educational outreach programs for pre-university students and teachers. He has also been a faculty member at Bard College in their innovative Citizen Science program, an interactive laboratory, computer and problem-based-learning science curriculum that introduces freshmen students to critical thinking through the discovery and application of scientific principles. He was the Chair of the Institutional Animal Care and Use Committee at SIUC and continues to act as a consultant in the area of animal care. He is also an avid golfer and cyclist. John lives in Carbondale with his wife Judy, a high school science teacher. Kelly S. Bender received her B.S. in Biology from Southeast Missouri State University (1999) and her Ph.D. (2003) in Molecular Biology, Microbiology, and Biochemistry from Southern Illinois University-Carbondale. Her dissertation work focused on the genetics of perchlorate-reducing bacteria. During her post-doctoral fellowship, Kelly worked on the genetic regulation of sulfate-reducing bacteria in the laboratory of Judy Wall at the University of Missouri-Columbia. She also completed a transatlantic biotechnology fellowship at Uppsala University in Sweden researching regulatory small RNAs in bacteria. In 2006, Kelly returne
