Michael Freemantle attended KES from 1954-1961. After a post-doctoral research fellowship at Oxford University (1967-1969), he worked in the chemical industry for two years. From 1971 to 1985, he taught chemistry at various levels both in the UK and abroad. In 1985, he was appointed Information Officer for IUPAC (International Union of Pure & Applied Chemistry) where his duties included editing the IUPAC news magazine Chemistry International. From 1994 to 2007 he was European Science Editor/Senior Correspondent for Chemical & Engineering News - the weekly news magazine of the American Chemical Society, before being appointed Science Writer in Residence at Queen's University Belfast and Queens University Ionic Liquid Laboratories until 2010.

Today he remains a science writer and a Fellow of the Royal Society of Chemistry and has recently published a further book entitled Nature's amazing chemistry. Michael writes of his book, "Nature is the supreme chemist. The chapters in this book sketch examples of my own fascination with nature’s awesome chemistry. They cover an eclectic and fairly random choice of topics, often triggered by curiosity, for example, while out walking, watching TV documentaries, reading the scientific literature – or by just looking out of my study window at the world outside." This book is Michael's 5th publication that also includes one fiction book.