Abstract Mike Waterfield was a biochemist with a passion for the application of state-of-the-art technology, and his developments in protein sequencing opened doors previously closed to the research community. Most profoundly, through the sequencing of platelet-derived growth factor and the epidermal growth factor receptor, Mike demonstrated that these growth-associated proteins were proto-oncogenes—they had been hijacked in experimental retroviral systems as drivers of cancer and, by inference, were likely targets for medical intervention. Mike exploited his sequencing capabilities in facilitating advances for many colleagues both within his home institute of the Imperial Cancer Research Fund and then as director of the Ludwig Institute for Cancer Research (LICR) at University College London, as well as through many collaborators in the global research community. At the LICR, his own laboratory defined the complexity of the phosphoinositide 3-kinase (PI 3-kinase) family and brought a deep understanding of these proteins and their pathobiology. Mike went on to develop inhibitors of these proteins, co-founding PiraMed, which, through the subsequent Roche acquisition, led to the approval of the PI 3-kinase inhibitor inavolisib.
Abstract Portrait of Tullio Pozzan, a man with white hair and blue eyes, wearing a dark suit, white shirt, and patterned dark blue tie, looking forward with a slight smile. Below the portrait is his handwritten signature. Tullio Pozzan was a pioneer at the forefront of cell physiology for over 40 years, whose development of powerful new experimental methods profoundly increased our understanding of fundamental cellular processes. His seminal discovery in 1992 of mitochondrial calcium uptake to physiological levels of stimulation transformed our understanding of cell signalling. His work established the organelle as a central hub both in shaping cytosolic calcium signals and in orchestrating critical cell responses, such as energy production and cell death. Pozzan, working at the University of Padua for most of his career, was a polymath, making important and incisive contributions across a range of topics. These included the application of the first fluorescent intracellular calcium indicator dyes, the concept of synergy between second messenger pathways, the first fluorescent probes for measuring cytosolic pH and cyclic adenosine monophosphate (cAMP), the resurrection of mitochondria as indispensable components of physiological calcium signalling and the importance of local calcium signals in information transfer between organelles. Shortly before his unexpected death, Tullio opened fresh terrain into the patho-physiology of Alzheimer's disease and was developing new tools for measuring mitochondrial calcium in vivo. He was a captivating and thought-provoking speaker and an erudite writer of insightful reviews.
Abstract Black and white portrait showing John Stewart Turner, an older man with a receding hairline, wearing thick-framed glasses, a light-colored textured suit jacket, a white shirt, and a light-colored tie with a dotted pattern. He smiles slightly and looks directly forward. Below the portrait, his handwritten signature reads J S Turner. This biography summarizes the life and contributions of John Stewart Turner, a remarkable scientist who provided revolutionary and enduring insights into the physics of fluid flow processes, especially focusing on their roles in the atmosphere, oceans and geological phenomena. He pioneered two new fields: double-diffusive convection and geological fluid mechanics. His approach was to use a combination of simple, yet very insightful laboratory experiments in conjunction with careful mathematical analysis based on perceptive physical reasoning. Stewart explored the range of double-diffusive phenomena that occur in a fluid when it is stratified by two components with different diffusivities, such as heat and salt in the ocean, and made profound discoveries in geological flows such as magmas and vents in the deep sea. He was an extremely supportive mentor to students and junior colleagues and applied these traits to his family, who were the centre of his life.
Abstract Ian Macdonald was a pure mathematician whose work involved group theory, algebraic combinatorics and the theory of special functions. He is notable for his great originality and an almost infallible intuition for posing fundamental research questions, conjectures that were a driving force for work central to representation theory and the Langlands programme. He became well known for his book Symmetric functions and Hall polynomials, appreciated by combinatorialists and algebraists alike, and his identities on root systems led rapidly to the theory of representations of affine Lie algebras. In 1987 he defined in highly original work a class of two-variable polynomials associated with root systems, which are now known as Macdonald polynomials. The impact of these polynomials, both in mathematics and in theoretical physics, has been enormous.
Abstract In 1947 the award of a Royal Scholarship at Imperial College’s Department of Mathematics launched Trevor Stuart from a working-class family in Leicester into a career in the Aerodynamics Division of the National Physical Laboratory (NPL) just at a time when post-war government scientific institutions were growing rapidly. The outstanding nature of his early work as a pioneer of the theory of hydrodynamic stability was formally recognized in 1961 when, at the age of 32, he became the youngest Senior Principal Scientific Officer with a Special Merit Award in the Scientific Civil Service. The reorganization and transfer of NPL’s Aerodynamics Division to RAE Farnborough ultimately led to Trevor moving to a chair in his old department at Imperial in 1966. Trevor’s pioneering work on fluid flow instabilities in systems where initially small disturbances rapidly grow to finite values was a key development in the theoretical understanding of the first stage (weakly nonlinear) of transition to full-scale turbulence. Plane parallel flow and circular Couette flow were two examples to which he devoted much time and energy. Although reserved in manner, Trevor was a natural leader and a good judge of scientific potential in younger colleagues. In the latter part of his career he served on the Council of the Royal Society, as a head of department (twice), as a Dean of the Royal College of Science within Imperial, as a chair of the (then) Science and Engineering Research Council Mathematics Committee and as President of the London Mathematical Society.
Abstract Professor C. S. Seshadri was an internationally renowned mathematician whose research covered many topics. The continuing theme of much of this work was the study of moduli spaces: algebraic varieties that classify various types of algebro-geometric objects such as curves and vector bundles. As with physical maps, these give an explicit representation of the totality of objects of a particular kind all at once. His first major breakthrough was his construction with M. S. Narasimhan of such a moduli space for vector bundles on a curve over the complex numbers. He studied all aspects of these spaces using invariant theory, unitary representations, ampleness criteria and compactifications. Later, he took up a second question: the explicit description in all characteristics of Schubert varieties, which are moduli for multiple configurations of linear subspaces of projective space. After retirement, he built from scratch a new institute that is a model for a fresh approach to Indian education, named the Chennai Mathematical Institute. In this he showed organizational brilliance quite unique among mathematicians.
Abstract Black-and-white portrait photograph of Ioan Mackenzie James. He is shown from the chest up, smiling slightly while facing the camera. He has wavy, medium-length hair, prominent eyebrows, and wears a dark suit jacket, white shirt, and patterned tie. The background consists of vertically grained wood paneling. A handwritten signature appears below the photograph. Ioan James was one of the small group of mathematicians who developed research in algebraic topology in the UK in the postwar period. This was a topic of intense worldwide activity in the 1950s and 1960s, and James made significant contributions in the area of homotopy theory, leading the group in Oxford from 1960 until his retirement. In later life he broadened his interests and in particular wrote on the history of the subject and on the lives of mathematicians and scientists more generally.
Abstract James Gordon Williams was a giant in his field of polymer engineering and in particular in the area of fracture and fracture mechanics. He joined the Department of Mechanical Engineering at Imperial College London as an undergraduate in 1958, having served as an apprentice at the Royal Aircraft Establishment, Farnborough, since 1956. He remained at Imperial through to the end of his life. He completed his PhD with Hugh Ford (FRS 1967) in 1963 on the then new topic of the mechanical properties of polymers. This proved an inspired choice since polymer science and engineering grew very rapidly, with major companies developing new products that demanded new materials and new engineering solutions for measuring and predicting their mechanical properties. He joined the academic staff of the Department of Mechanical Engineering in 1962, was promoted to a chair in polymer engineering in 1975 and served as head of department from 1990 to 2000. He became an emeritus professor in 2018. While his interests included all mechanical properties, over time Gordon’s emphasis moved towards fracture and particularly applying fracture mechanics to polymers, which was a rapidly developing field. He published the definitive book on the subject, Fracture mechanics of polymers, in 1984. His interests then broadened to include the fracture of composites and adhesives, and to providing standard test methods. Gordon also became involved in the theory of cutting as a method for measuring the toughness of soft materials including polymers such as polyethylene but also foods such as cheese. In 2016, upon his return from a conference in Sicily, he fell from a ladder while he was pruning climbing wall plants in his garden and suffered serious head injuries. Although he made an amazing recovery, he did not undertake scientific work again.
Abstract Professor Alex Bradshaw was an internationally recognized experimentalist in the study of the physics and chemistry of well-characterized solid surfaces, developing and exploiting a range of novel techniques to investigate molecular adsorption and reaction on single crystal surfaces in ultra-high vacuum conditions. Originally trained as a physical chemist, he went on to become a highly respected physicist, as witnessed, for example, by his election to be the president of the German Physical Society. He founded, and became director of, the Surface Physics Department of the Fritz Haber Institute in Berlin (a Max Planck Society institute), while also becoming scientific director of the Berlin Electron Storage Ring Society for Synchrotron Radiation. Alongside almost 30 years of research achievements in surface science, recognized by a series of national and international awards, his success in management of science led to a huge change in 1999, when he was invited to become science director of the much larger Max Planck Institute for Plasma Physics (IPP) with a totally different scientific focus on high-temperature plasma physics and nuclear fusion. Here it was his skill in science management that led to a significant reorganization of the IPP and its success in overcoming important challenges in the realization of the newly expanded goals of the institute.
Abstract Black-and-white photograph of Percival Allen. Percival Allen was born and raised in Brede, a small village in East Sussex, located on Lower Cretaceous Wealden strata. His interests spanned the natural sciences. He devoted his life to geology, primarily researching the character and palaeoenvironments of the Wealden sediments in both the Weald and Wessex depositional basins, especially the former in its type area. His first publication, written when an undergraduate student at the University of Reading, discussed the geological succession of the Brede area. At the early age of 35 he succeeded to the chair of geology at Reading and during the following 40 years built a geology department that gained a global reputation for excellence in sedimentological research. He made numerous contributions to the growth of the university, notably as dean of science at a critical period in the 1960s. On the national stage, he became Vice-President of the Royal Society, promoted European cooperation and was a leader in the growing independent British geoconservation movement.
Abstract Photogrpah of Eleanor Anne Maguire. Eleanor Anne Maguire (1970–2025) was an Irish neuroscientist renowned for her ground-breaking research into human memory, spatial navigation and the role of the hippocampus in these processes. She served as professor of cognitive neuroscience at University College London, where she was also a Wellcome Trust principal research fellow and deputy director of the Wellcome Trust Centre for Neuroimaging. She was a pioneer in the use of neuroimaging and virtual reality to study human memory in ‘real-life’ scenarios. Her most famous work involved studying London taxi drivers, demonstrating that acquiring ‘the knowledge’ was associated with an increase in the volume of part of their hippocampus. This result demonstrated that the human brain remains plastic and can form new connections in adult life. Having shown that the human hippocampus is involved in navigation as well as memory, Maguire developed ‘scene construction theory’. This theory unifies a range of cognitive functions and has had a significant effect on the field of neuroscience.
Abstract Photograph of Alan Lindsay Mackay. Alan Mackay, a crystallographer who challenged conventional ideas of crystallography, will probably be mainly remembered for his prediction of quasi-crystals. Joining Bernal's Birkbeck laboratory soon after World War II, when crystallography was in its early days, he made significant contributions to the field's development. In the 1960s he began to challenge the dominance of the lattice in classical crystallography. Arguing alternatively for the importance of local interactions led to the eponymous Mackay icosahedron that made a major impact on particle, cluster and intermetallics research. He solved the problem of non-periodically filling three-dimensional space with entities possessing five-fold symmetry, work that led to him predicting the occurrence of quasi-crystals, the experimental discoverer of which was awarded the Nobel Prize in chemistry. Pioneering contributions he made to generalizing crystallography included alternative ways of looking at structures based on curved two-dimensional surfaces, an approach that has wider applications outside science. Speaking, reading and writing in several languages, he travelled widely, becoming an expert in Russian and Eastern science, and developed collaborations throughout the globe—his home welcomed a frequent stream of scientific visitors who always found a warm welcome. He had strong views on the nature of science and on the role of science in society, concerned that science should be making the world a better place. Although some of his achievements were not properly recognized, he considered himself privileged to have taken part in what he called the Republic of Science—and he had a great, and often mischievous, sense of humour.
Abstract Photograph of Anthony George Cullis. Anthony (‘Tony’) George Cullis was distinguished for his pioneering studies of the microscopic structure and behaviour of semiconducting materials. He provided the first crystallographic details of the complex impurity-iron silicide precipitation processes in electronic device grade silicon, and of the important precipitation of elemental arsenic in bulk gallium arsenide. Studies of high-speed solidification phenomena in silicon, using Q-switched laser-induced melts, revealed notable evidence of constitutional supercooling and a large enhancement of substitutional dopant solubility. He observed conclusively that amorphous silicon melts by a first-order phase transition and obtained the solidification velocity required to amorphize it. He was the first to demonstrate, by transmission electron microscopy, that a quantum-domain crystalline nanostructure exists in porous silicon and can account for its highly efficient light emission, under photo-excitation. Later, his work on epitaxial growth showed that strain waves in surface ripples on mismatched semiconductor layers correlate with segregation of the larger atomic species to the crests of the waves, leading to partial relief of the elastic strain in these parts before eventually plastic relaxation by misfit dislocation generation near the still highly strained surface troughs occurs. This model has revolutionized the explanation of the so-called Stranski–Krastanow growth transition of compressively strained epitaxial layers from two-dimensional flat sheets to three-dimensional islands. As those are important for their use as quantum dots in (opto-)electronic devices such as laser diodes, these studies may be regarded as his technologically most relevant legacy, since they explain why and how real, ternary or quaternary quantum dot systems differ chemically and microstructurally from the nominally flat and thin binary layers often deposited.
Abstract Photograph showing GEORGE ADRIAN HORRIDGE. Adrian Horridge is famous for his pioneering studies of invertebrate vision, wherein he used a variety of techniques, including optical analysis of the eyes, electrophysiology of the visual pathways, investigation of behaviour and development of mathematical models of visual capacity and performance. Born, raised and educated in the United Kingdom, Horridge moved to Australia in the late 1960s to take up a position as a founding professor of the Australian National University's Research School of Biological Sciences. He established a thriving department of neurobiology, which became one of the world's leading entities in this field. He went on to establish a centre for visual science at the university to foster collaboration across several laboratories on campus. This ultimately led to the establishment of the very successful Australian Centre for Excellence in Vision Science, funded by the Australian Research Council and including participation from other laboratories across Australia, as well from overseas. He was elected to the Fellowship of the Royal Society (1969) and the Australian Academy of Science (1971). Horridge continued to study and publish the results of his investigations on insect vision well beyond the date of his official retirement. He has received several awards and honours in recognition of his work. Horridge is also known for his studies in another, quite unrelated field—the design of Indonesian sailing craft from antiquity to the twentieth century.
David Headley Green AM, FAA, FRS was an outstanding Australian geologist and world leader in experimental petrology and geochemistry. His research, initially at the Australian National University with A. E. Ringwood, and later at the University of Tasmania, shaped our understanding of the composition of the Earth’s mantle and the origin of the wide spectrum of volcanic rocks erupted in different global tectonic settings. David also had a significant impact on Antarctic science through studies of high-grade metamorphic rocks, but more broadly in fostering marine and climate science by championing the establishment at the University of Tasmania of a multidisciplinary research centre (now the Institute for Marine and Antarctic Studies). His achievements and scientific leadership were recognized with many international and national awards, including membership of the Order of Australia. A considerate and compassionate man, David is also remembered for his interest in and care for others. Note: This memoir is re-published from Historical Records of Australian Science (HRAS) with permission (Jaques et al. 2025). Minor adaptations have been made.
Ronald Mason was a chemist who made contributions to crystallography, organometallic chemistry and the understanding of crystal and molecular structures. He was born in Merthyr Vale, Wales, and was an undergraduate in Cardiff. He took his PhD at University College London on crystallography under the supervision of Kathleen Lonsdale FRS. After a lectureship at Imperial College, he was appointed professor of inorganic chemistry at the University of Sheffield at the young age of 33. Following a move to the University of Sussex, he was made Chief Scientific Adviser to the Ministry of Defence in 1977. There he wrote a very influential report with Sir Antony Duff that was the basis for the UK Trident programme for nuclear deterrence, which has remained in place to the present day. He also conducted a review proposing that all government departments have a Chief Scientific Adviser, which was, in due course, implemented. He was subsequently chairman of the University College London Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust, where he was involved in several major developments. He was appointed Knight Commander of the Order of the Bath in 1980.
Christopher Marshall was a cell biologist by training, who was recognized for his contribution to cancer biology. He graduated from the natural sciences tripos in Cambridge and obtained his DPhil from Oxford. Following postdoctoral studies in London and Boston, he returned to the UK to take a position at the Institute of Cancer Research, where he remained for the rest of his life. Chris made major discoveries in the identification and understanding of the oncogenic mechanisms of RAS and MAPKs, delineating signalling pathways that are activated through various mechanisms in most cancers. His work contributed to the development of small molecule inhibitors of several of the proteins involved that are now in routine clinical use, perfectly encapsulating the concept of bench to bedside research. Chris nurtured and developed the career of scores of trainees, including those that worked with him and many who were enthused by simply meeting him or following his work. By inspiring generations of cancer biologists, Chris passed on the passion and rigour that he brought to his studies, and his legacy lives on in their work.
In the wake of independence, impelled by Nehru’s vision, India saw a great flowering of scientific institutions. Among these was the Tata Institute of Fundamental Research (TIFR), and this is where M. S. Narasimhan grew from being a graduate student to a towering figure in Indian science. He distinguished himself as a mathematician, teacher and administrator. After his retirement from TIFR, he went on to a second innings as director of the Mathematics Department at the International Centre for Theoretical Physics in Trieste, where he built up a strong school in algebraic geometry. Narasimhan was an extraordinarily versatile researcher, contributing significantly to analysis, representation theory, differential geometry and algebraic geometry. Two related discoveries have in particular proved to be of great importance. The first is the application of stability in classifying a family of algebro-geometric objects, identifying the dominant part that parameterizes semistable objects, and then adding other components built out of extensions of smaller semistable objects. The second insight is that stable objects are characterized as those that satisfy non-linear partial differential equations, a discovery that foretold major developments 20 years later.
John Coates was an internationally renowned mathematician, who specialized in number theory. He grew up in Australia, but spent his career in the USA, France and the UK. He was best known for his promotion of Iwasawa theory as a method of studying elliptic curves, and in particular the conjecture of Bryan Birch (FRS 1972) and Peter Swinnerton-Dyer (FRS 1967). His celebrated theorem on this topic (jointly with his student Andrew Wiles (FRS 1989)) was the first general result on this problem, which remains unsolved to this day. He continued working in this area for much of his life and was extremely influential both as a teacher and as a researcher. He also travelled extensively in Asia and had an important effect on the development of algebraic number theory in South Korea and in China, as well as pursuing significant collaborations with mathematicians in Japan.
Martin Jim Aitken was a pioneering physicist who profoundly influenced the new discipline of archaeometry, bridging physics to archaeology and revolutionizing artefact dating and analysis methods. Born and raised in Lincolnshire, he accepted a radio bursary to Wadham College, Oxford in 1941. After four years' RAF service during the Second World War, he returned to Oxford, completing BA and MA studies in physics, a DPhil and early postdoctoral research in nuclear physics at the Clarendon Laboratory. In 1957 his career shifted when he led the application of neutron activation analysis to ancient coins, sparking a lifelong devotion to archaeological science. He innovated the use of proton free precession to detect buried remains, in 1958 uncovering Romano-British kilns at Durobrivae and defensive earthen structures at Verulamium, then introduced ‘archaeomagnetism’, utilizing remanent magnetism measurements to reconstruct Earth’s magnetic field history. His greatest contribution soon followed: establishing thermoluminescence dating of pottery and burnt flints as an indispensable technique in archaeology and human origins research. He subsequently developed optically stimulated luminescence and infrared stimulated luminescence for dating sediments, transformational for both Earth sciences and prehistory. As Oxford professor of archaeometry and, for 30 years, the distinguished deputy director of the Research Laboratory for Archaeology and the History of Art (RLAHA) at Oxford, he was a passionate educator and science communicator. He founded the journal Archaeometry, established international symposia and conferences to promote knowledge-sharing, and left a deep legacy extending through his students, colleagues, the impact of RLAHA and international scientific communities, which he inspired.
