Dr Michael Tomlinson DPhil

BSc (University of Bath)

DPhil (University of Oxford)

Dr Mike Tomlinson grew up in Birmingham before studying as an undergraduate at the University of Bath.  Mike was one of the founders of the tetraspanin field during his PhD at the Sir William Dunn School of Pathology in Oxford, supervised by immunologists Neil Barclay and Mark Wright.  Between 1996 and 2003 he did post-doctoral work in two leading lymphocyte cell signalling groups in the USA, run by Joe Bolen at DNAX Research Institute in Palo Alto, and by Art Weiss at the University of California, San Francisco. 

In 2004 he moved back to the UK to join the platelet research group of Steve Watson in the Institute of Biomedical Research at the University of Birmingham.  Mike started his own research group in 2005 through a MRC New Investigator Award Fellowship to study tetraspanin regulation of platelet receptors.  In 2009 he obtained a British Heart Foundation Senior Fellowship to expand his tetraspanin research to endothelial cells, and moved across campus to the School of Biosciences. 

Mike became a Senior Lecturer in 2014 and a Reader in Membrane Protein Biology in 2021. He has received research funding from the British Heart Foundation, BBSRC, MRC, European Research Council, Birmingham-Maastricht PhD Programme, MRC Harwell and the biotech industry.  His current work aims to capitalise on the growing potential of tetraspanins as drug targets in a variety of human disease processes.

Mike is module coordinator for the 2^nd year module Topics in Medical Biosciences and brings his research-led teaching to the following modules:

● Cell Biology & Physiology (1^st year)

● Cell & Developmental Biology (2^nd year)

● Topics in Medical Biosciences (2^nd year)

● Cancer Biology (3^rd year)

● Molecular & Cellular Immunology (3^rd year)

● Functional Genomics (masters)

Research Techniques (masters)

Research Developments & Funding (masters)

Pharmaceuticals & Therapeutic Biologicals from Bench to Market (masters)

Mike also supervises final year research projects for several BSc, MSci, MSc and MRes students each year.

Mike has supervised eight PhD students to completion and has three current PhD students in his group.

Mike’s group investigates how tetraspanins regulate other important membrane proteins on the surface of human cells.

Mike has recently established a new paradigm in human membrane protein biology, whereby the important cell surface ‘molecular scissor’ ADAM10 is not one scissor, but six different scissors depending on which one of six tetraspanins, termed the TspanC8s, it is associated with – his ‘six scissor’ hypothesis.  This has major implications for future therapeutic targeting of diseases such as cancer, Alzheimer’s disease, asthma and inflammatory diseases including those leading to heart attack and stroke.  Targeting all six ADAM10 scissors in these diseases would be too toxic for the patient, but targeting the one scissor that is causing the disease has great potential.

Mike has also identified tetraspanin Tspan18 as a critical regulator of the store-operated Ca²⁺ entry channel Orai1 on endothelial cells, and as a potential therapeutic target for thrombo-inflammatory diseases such as deep vein thrombosis.

Dr Tomlinson leads the School of Biosciences Cells and Molecules Research Theme

Website

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Related Research: 

Centre of Membrane Proteins and Receptors (COMPARE): http://www.birmingham-nottingham.ac.uk/compare/

When not chasing after one of his four young children, Dr Tomlinson can be found watching the Liverpool football team, growing chillies, or contemplating his next snowboarding or fishing trip.