This proposal is almost exactly the same as last year's Marsden proposal. It has two international collaborators Prof William Whitman at the University of Georgia and Assoc Prof Evert Duin at Auburn University, Alabama. it will also require a Massey University supervisor, Assoc Prof Andrew Sutherland-Smith. International students have made some progress on thermophilic methanogen targets which are incorporated as preliminary results. The proposal is basically about increasing our understanding of the activation pathway which is required to reduce the nickel ion of methanogen cofactor F430 and other enzymes that are highly conserved and are likely to be involved in methane formation at a fundamental level.