Professor Terence Allen's career spanned 40 years research in Cell Structure and Function at the Paterson Institute for Cancer Research, Christie Hospital Manchester, and the University of Manchester. His special research interests included the mechanisms controlling cell shape, cell replacement in blood skin and gut tissues, and the structure of chromosomes. He has published in excess of 200 papers in peer-reviewed journals and is a member of the British Society for Cell Biology, the Biochemical Society and the Royal Microscopial Society.

Dr Graham Cowling has been director and teacher on a Masters programme in oncology and postgraduate tutor for research students in cancer studies at the Medical School, Univeristy of Manchester, for the past ten years. He has written a number of research papers and contributed reviews and chapters to books.