Keith Burridge

Keith Burridge (born 1 July 1950) is a British researcher and Kenan distinguished Professor at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. His research on focal adhesions includes the discovery of many adhesion proteins including vinculin, talin and paxillin, and ranks him in top 1% of the most cited scientist in the field of molecular biology and genetics.

Focal adhesion research He went as a postdoc to James D. Watson's laboratory at Cold Spring Harbor where he met Elias Lazarides. They also noted that there was a concentration of α-actinin in plaques at the ends of stress fibers. Since these regions would several years later be named focal adhesions, α-actinin was the first protein found to be concentrated at these sites.

In 1981 Burridge left Cold Spring Harbor Lab for a faculty position at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, where he continued to work on focal adhesions. He then discovered other focal adhesion components including paxillin and palladin. Since then his work has focused on the signaling pathways emanating from focal adhesions, including RhoA-mediated contractility and tyrosine phosphorylation in response to adhesion.

Playwright In parallel with his scientific career, Keith Burridge has written several plays of varying length. His 10-minute play "Chocolates for Mr. Wolfowitz" appeared in the Knutsford Little Theatre short play festival of 2008 in the UK. "The Art of Deception", based on the true story of the art forger Han van Meegeren, won 2014 best new play by Playwrights First. "The First Woman President" is a one-woman, one act play, that was premiered in the Midtown International Theatre Festival in New York City in 2016. In the play Edith Wilson looks back to when she took over running the country while concealing from the public that her husband, President Woodrow Wilson, had suffered a stroke

Distinction and awards 1988 Hettleman Prize. 2002 Freshman Medical Student Teaching Award, UNC School of Medicine.