Jon Y. Takemoto received a Ph.D. degree in microbiology (1973) from the University of California, Los Angeles where he trained under microbial biochemist June Lascelles. He was Maria Moors Cabot Postdoctoral Research Fellow (1973-1974) and NIH Postdoctoral Fellow (1974) with Lawrence Bogorad at the Biological Laboratories, Harvard University. Dr. Takemoto then had successive appointments as Assistant (1975-1980), Associate (1980-1985), Full Professor (1985-2021), and Professor Emeritus (2021-present) at Utah State University. He was Visiting Professor at the Institut fur Biologie, Freiburg Universitat (Germany) (1981-1982), Visiting Professor in the School of Engineering, Hiroshima University (Japan) (1989-1990), and Visiting Scholar, Department Pathology, University of Southern California, Keck School of Medicine (2016-2017). He is recipient of the UCLA Graduate Alumni Award in Biological Sciences (1973), Alexander von Humboldt Fellowship (1981-1982), Long-Term Fellowship of the Japan Society for the Promotion of Science (1989-1990), USU College of Science Researcher of the Year award (1991), and USU Graduate Mentor of the Year award (2002). He was USU Biology Department Head (2003-2006), Director of the USU Molecular Biology Program (1991-1993), member of several grant review panels (NSF, NIH, AHA, and USDA), and currently serves as a review editor of Frontiers in Microbiology and on the grant review board of the Italian Ministry of Education, Universities, and Research (MUIR). His research topics are the biology of photosynthetic microbes and microbial natural products (cyclic lipodepsipeptides, antifungal aminoglycosides and anti-inflammatory heme-derived bilins).