Bob Michell is Royal Society Research Professor at the University of Birmingham. How cells respond to environmental signals, and alter their phenotype accordingly, is one of the central questions underlying contemporary research in cell biology and disease pathogenesis. In many circumstances the cellular response involves the turnover of inositol phospholipids at the cell membrane as one of the immediate signal transduction events. Professor Bob Michell is the person who, more than any other, established the field of receptor-mediated inositol lipid hydrolysis as a major clinically-important research area.