Michael Vivian Berridge (born 1946) is a New Zealand cell biologist. Since 1976, he has led the cancer cell and molecular biology research group at the Malaghan Institute of Medical Research. He is also a professor at Victoria University of Wellington and a Distinguished Research Fellow at the Malaghan Institute of Medical Research. He is best known for elucidating cellular mechanisms of reduction of tetrazolium dyes that are widely used in biology, and for the discovery of mitochondrial genome transfer from healthy cells to mitochondrial DNA-deficient cancer cells.
Early life and education Berridge was born in Auckland in 1946 and was brought up in Northland, Naumai and Dargaville. He did an undergraduate in Chemistry at the University of Auckland and conducted his honours project in cell biology. Following this, he continued to study at the University of Auckland, completing an MSc (Hons) in 1969 and a PhD in cell biology in 1971 working with a group of plant growth hormones called cytokines. These theses investigated how kinetin interacts with protein synthesis in plants.
Career and research
In 1973, Berridge undertook a postdoctoral position at Purdue University in developmental molecular biology. working under Professor Arthur Aronson. There, he investigated how mRNA formed from heterogeneous nuclear RNA, including exploration of enzymes involved in RNA processing. He then undertook a staff scientist position at the National Institute for Medical Research, Mill Hill London, UK, working under Dr Jamshed Tata in Developmental Biology. In 1976, he returned to New Zealand and established the Cancer Cell & Molecular Biology Research Group as one of the founding researchers of the Wellington Cancer & Medical Research Institute, later renamed the Malaghan Institute of Medical Research. Here, he first investigated blood cell development, with a focus on determinants of stem cells differentiation. His research group then collaborated with Dr Fu-Keun Lin at Amgen to characterise the cellular receptor of the red cell hormone, erythropoietin, and its ability to stimulate platelet production. Having found that cytokines and hormones change the way in which glucose is taken up by cells, Berridge shifted his research focus to glucose metabolism. Research from 2009 to 2015, in collaboration Professor Jiri Neuzil (Griffith University, QLD, Australia and BIOCEV, Prague, and Dr Lanfeng Dong (Griffith University, QLD) used mitochondrial DNA polymorphisms to unequivocally show mitochondrial genome transfer from healthy cells to cancer cells lacking mitochondrial DNA, and that this occurred by intercellular mitochondrial transfer. As a result, he shifted his research focus to mitochondrial cancer biology. Using genetic knock-out mouse models, his lab group currently investigates how proteins encoded in nuclear DNA contribute to the formation of mitochondrial respiratory complexes and the role of these complexes in tumour metastasis. He is also applying this knowledge to develop an early detection assay for mitochondrial damage in neurodegenerative diseases. Berridge has published popular science books including The Edge of Life in 2015, and Sugar, Rum and Tobacco: Taxes and Public Health in New Zealand with Lisa Marriott in 2017.
Awards and honours In 2003, Berridge received a James Cook Research Fellowship in health sciences from the Royal Society Te Apārangi. He was awarded the Health Research Council of New Zealand Liley Medal in 2016 for an outstanding contribution to health and medical sciences in the field of cellular metabolism. The same year he was a semi-finalist in the KiwiBank New Zealander of the Year Awards. In 2021, he was awarded the Shorland Medal by the New Zealand Association of Scientists in recognition of major and continued contribution to basic or applied research that has added significantly to scientific understanding or resulted in significant benefits to society. In December 2021, Berridge was awarded a higher Doctorate of Science by Victoria University of Wellington Council, based on a body of published work conducted in close association with the University from 1976-2020.
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