Bill Grant

We have learned, with sadness, of the death of Professor William (Bill) Grant, Emeritus Professor in the former Department of Infection, Immunity and Inflammation.

Shaun Heaphy and Peter Sheldon write:

William Duncan Grant, known to all as Bill, was born on 28 May 1942 in Edinburgh and died in Leicester on 2 August 2024. He was educated at Heriot’s School in Edinburgh and then at Edinburgh University, gaining a first class degree in Bacteriology in 1964 and a PhD in bacterial extracellular polysaccharides in 1968. A Fulbright scholarship enabled him to spend two years in the USA at the McArdle Cancer Laboratory, University of Wisconsin at Madison. He then joined the Genetics Department at the University of Leicester where he initially studied the slime mould Physarum polycephalum.

The Department of Microbiology with Peter Sneath as the founding chair was established in Leicester in 1974; Dorothy Jones was also a founding member. Bill joined them as a lecturer along with Frank Odds, Peter Sheldon and a little later Jeff Almond. Bill and his colleagues established the new Department of Microbiology in both the Schools of Biological Sciences and Medicine. Bill advanced through the academic ranks, contributing to both teaching and University administration. He served as a Head of Department in the early 1990s and in recognition of his research contributions was promoted to a personal chair in Environmental Microbiology a few years later. He retired in 2008 and as an Emeritus Professor continued to be a regular presence in the Department and to publish for another ten years. 

Bill’s research endeavours were many, including: a biological method of water purification for poor countries in collaboration with the Engineering Department of the University; life detection methods in collaboration with the Space Research Centre and Department of Physics, for use on the ESA Mars Lander; and ancient halophiles, hundreds of millions of years old (see accompanying picture taken in 2002). He is most well known for his studies of extremophilic microorganisms, populating unusual, to us, environments. He was the pioneer in identifying and studying halophiles and especially alkaliphilic halophiles - that is to say, organisms that grow in very salty and highly alkaline conditions that prevail in soda lakes around the world.

This interest was initiated in the late 1970s by Allan Mills of the Geology Department, who brought back water samples from the Rift Valley lakes in East Africa for Bill to examine. Nothing was known about the microbial content of soda lakes prior to this. Peter Sheldon remembers Bill being initially frustrated that he could not identify anything in the samples until the idea of using acridine orange, a DNA intercalating agent occurred. He immediately found fluorescing microorganisms. Bill sent a student to the Rift Valley lakes in 1979 to collect samples; he first visited in 1985. David Widdowson, then at the University of Nairobi, later a Chief Safety Officer at the University of Leicester, was an early collaborator. This was followed over the next 25 years by many sampling trips to Kenya and later China.

Bill established lifelong scientific collaborations and friendships, notably with his wife Dr Susan Grant! But also with Koki Horikoshi of the RIKEN Institute in Tokyo, Brian Jones of Genencor and others, including one of us (SH). He spent sabbaticals at both RIKEN and in Naples, Italy. Bill’s research was funded by the Royal Society, research councils, industry and the EU. His scientific output was prodigious, exceeding 260 papers and dozens of patents. The commercial products of his research, enzymes in detergents, are widely used today and may yet find other roles. Bill received a Lifetime Achievement award from the Society of Extremophiles Research in 2012. His peers have named three species of microorganisms after him: Halarchaeum grantii, Clostridium grantii and Natranaerobius grantii. Uniquely his name also defines a new genus, Billgrantia.

Bill was a warm man and he enjoyed teaching. He wrote a textbook, Environmental Microbiology, first published in 1981. Generations of students knew him through the annual microbiology field trip and his course in Environmental Microbiology. He taught innovative undergraduate practical classes until he retired. He was highly regarded by colleagues and students, always advancing their interests when the opportunity arose. We also remember him as our friend; nights drinking Ruddle’s beer in the pubs of East Leicestershire or duty free gin in hotel rooms after a day of fieldwork.

In his younger days Bill was a keen rugby player. During his retirement he enjoyed gardening, exploring Leicester lanes in his vintage MGB-GT, and cooking. He is survived by his wife Susan, his children Alexander and Oliver and a grandchild Rupert.