In Touch Autumn 2010 by King's College London

autumn 2010

john ellis on the secrets of the universe

Kingâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s ÂŁ500 million global campaign at home with

ws gilbert all change life as a new mp

Spring 2010 IN TOUCH

IFC5

• For every £1 you donate the UK Government will add an extra 33%. • The increased value of your gift will have an immediate impact. • All donations to the Annual Fund around the world are eligible.

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• Up to £200 million of additional funding is available through the Government’s Matched Funding scheme. The College can only benefit when you donate.

‘33% Extra FREE from Matched Funding; this really is too good a Government-funded opportunity to pass up, so please give as generously as you can to make this year’s Annual Fund Appeal our most successful ever.’ Professor Rick Trainor, Principal

For more information on this scheme please visit www.alumni.kcl.ac.uk/giving or contact the Development and Alumni Office on +44 (0)20 7848 4701

Contents Welcome In Touch Autumn 2010

What a time for King’s. Not only has it just been named University of the Year by The Sunday Times, it’s also poised to launch the most ambitious fundraising campaign in its history. World questions | King’s answers aims to raise £500 million to further the College’s pioneering work in tackling some of the most pressing issues on earth, focusing on neuroscience and mental health, leadership and society, and cancer. Find out more in our 10-page special feature from page 28. Elsewhere, John Ellis, one of the world’s foremost particle physicists and King’s new Clerk Maxwell Professor, explains how we’re closer than ever to unlocking the secrets of the universe (page 16). While Sarah Wollaston (page 20) recalls how she became an MP, almost overnight in political terms, David Barker (page 26) how he challenged the medical status quo, and WS Gilbert (page 22), in his own inimitable words, on how be became a Victorian superstar. Enjoy.

what’s inside 4 The Big Picture

20 Sarah Wollaston

Meet the a cappella group All the King’s Men, fresh back from conquering the Edinburgh Fringe

Doctor one minute, MP the next. The ‘real’ new member for Totnes on taking the fast track to Westminster

6 Update

Leukaemia and autism breakthroughs, exploring Brazil, John ‘Earthquake’ Milne, Wittgenstein at Guy’s, and the real meaning of Domesday

22 WS Gilbert

As the centenary of the death of the legendary librettist approaches, we revisit the great man himself in his ‘miniature kingdom’ at Harrow Weald 57 Prize Logic Puzzle 26 David Barker

One man’s pioneering epidemiological quest for the origin of chronic disease

16 John Ellis

Getting to the heart of matter with King’s new Clerk Maxwell Professor of Theoretical Physics, one of the key figures behind CERN’s mighty atom smasher In Touch is the magazine for the alumni and friends of Chelsea College, Guy’s Hospital Dental and Medical Schools, the Institute of Psychiatry, King’s College London, King’s College of Household and Social Science, King’s College School of Medicine and Dentistry, the Nightingale Institute, Normanby College, Queen Elizabeth College, the Royal Dental Hospital, St John’s Institute of Dermatology, St Thomas’ Medical School, UMDS.

Can you enter the Secret King’s Alumni Logic Puzzle Society? 58 Letters

A special in-depth report on King’s ambitious new fundraising campaign

Monty and Professor David Nokes remembered, plus a King’s athletics captain helps himself to a titanium hip

38 Community

59 This I’ve Learned

A bumper harvest of events, including this year’s Alumni Weekend and Duel Day, plus all your latest news and views

Professor Irene Higginson CBE, Director of King’s newly launched Cicely Saunders Institute of Palliative Care, reflects on the meaning of life

Get In Touch Alumni benefits and services

Editor Christian Smith Editorial assistant

Tel +44 (0)20 7848 3053 Email alumoff@kcl.ac.uk

Contributors

In Touch has been produced using paper from sustainable sources, and bleached using an Elemental Chlorine-free (ECF) process. The paper is produced at a mill that meets the ISO 14001 environmental management standard and the EMAS environmental management standard. The magazine is fully recyclable.

Editorial (alumni publications and website)

Tel +44 (0)20 7848 4703 Email amanda.calberry@kcl.ac.uk In Touch, King’s College London, Ground Floor Office, Strand Bridge House, 138-142 The Strand, London, WC2R 1HH

28 World questions | King’s answers

Amanda Calberry James Bressor, Cally Brown, Megan Bruns, Rachael Corver, David Cottrell, Melanie Gardner, Christine Kenyon Jones (English, PhD, 1999), the King’s College London Press Office, Louise Richards and Jarek Zaba.

Photography Phil Sayer (cover)

Suki Dhanda Illustrations Jason Ford Design Esterson Associates ©King’s College London 2010 Repro DawkinsColour Print Warners

The next issue of In Touch will be published in Spring 2011. In Touch is published by the King’s College London Alumni Office. The opinions expressed in it are those of the writers concerned and not necessarily those of the College.

For more alumni news go to www.alumni. kcl.ac.uk

autumn 2010 IN TOUCH

IN TOUCH

autumn 2010

This summer saw the all-male a cappella group All the King’s Men debut at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival to rave reviews and sell-out shows. The 12 students feature a distinctive vocal style with tight harmonies and original arrangements and their fun choreography and banter (suitable for all audiences!) add a new dimension to the many popular songs that they sing,

from the Bee Gees to the Black Eyed Peas. ‘At the Fringe we drew consistently large crowds,’ says group member Henry Southern. ‘We sold out our 140-seat theatre several times in what was one of the most successful debut shows of the festival. To cap this success, we beat the University of Oxford’s rival group, Out of the Blue, in a keenly fought

“A- Cappella-Off”. We have already booked our theatre there for next summer. In the meantime, we are preparing to tour America’s East Coast, performing at high schools and universities’. Henry adds, ‘The support of the whole King’s community has been great. Everyone seems to really enjoy our performances, which for us is the most important thing. We always hope that our

energy and fun approach is infectious and entertaining. More than anything, we hope that All the King’s Men will continue to develop and get better and better with new members, building on the reputation we have already created in less than a year.’ For information on gigs, or to buy the album, visit www.all-the-kings-men.com

autumn 2010 IN TOUCH

a few good men

Update From the Principal

King’s increasingly global view is reflected in our ambitious fundraising campaign which aims to tackle some of the world’s most pressing issues

These are exciting times at King’s. I had the opportunity to reflect on how the College has evolved over the years at the recent commemoration service in Westminster Abbey for Florence Nightingale. 2010 marks the centenary of her death, and the 150th anniversary of her founding the world’s first professional school of nursing from which our School of Nursing and Midwifery at King’s is directly descended. The service was addressed by Archbishop Desmond Tutu FKC, who explained how ‘as a King’s man’ he was thrilled and proud that the school she founded is ‘now part of his alma mater’, before leading a standing ovation for nurses throughout the world. It was a stirring moment. It was also a timely reminder for me of how rooted the College is, both in history and in London, yet how wide our horizons have become. Based in one of the world’s most global cities, we have pursued an increasingly ambitious internationalisation policy in recent years, which – without altering King’s role as a British university – has substantially

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autumn 2010

increased the numbers of our overseas students. Increasingly too, our curriculum and research reflect globalisation. We have just founded our new China and Brazil Institutes, soon to be supplemented by our India Institute. We have built a potent reputation as a centre of global academic excellence in both research and teaching, and we are consistently ranked amongst the world’s leading universities. The view from King’s is now a global one. That view is also reflected in our new and ambitious fundraising campaign, called World questions | King’s answers, which aims to raise £500 million from philanthropic sources. As you can read elsewhere in this issue, we are asking for support in addressing some of the world’s most urgent

As a former Prime Minister and Foreign Secretary, Sir John Major is an excellent standard bearer for such a global campaign

Archbishop Desmond Tutu FKC chats with nurses in historical dress after addressing a commemoration service for Florence Nightingale at Westminster Abbey

issues, in cancer treatment; neuroscience and mental health; and leadership and society. I am delighted that Sir John Major has very generously agreed to become the Chairman of our Campaign Board. As a former Prime Minister and Foreign Secretary, now a much sought after commentator on international affairs and Governor of the Peres Center for Peace, he is an excellent standard bearer for such a global campaign. Just as importantly, Sir John grew up and lived for many years in South London, where four of the College’s campuses are located, and his son James was born at King’s College Hospital. He has many links to the local community, and family and other circumstances have led him to have a keen interest in the key areas on which our campaign is focused. It is that combination that I find so heartening and resonant: an exceptional global perspective, with deep local roots. Just like King’s.

Making a difference to…

Broadcasting

University of the Year 2010 award

Mooted for many years, King’s Radio takes to the airwaves at last, thanks to supporters of the Annual Fund

Top of the class: University of the Year

strongest showings ever for the College in these two rankings. ‘King’s is an outstanding institution however you judge it,’ said Alastair McCall, Editor of The Sunday Times University Guide. ‘It is very rare for an institution to improve on every measure in our league tables – but that is what King’s has done this year.’

Wired ‘Janeites’ can now read rare manuscripts in Jane Austen’s own hand that have previously only ever been seen by a handful of privileged scholars, thanks to a new digital edition funded by the Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC). The Centre for Computing in the Humanities (CCH) at King’s worked on the project in collaboration with Jane Austen expert Professor Kathryn Sutherland from the University of Oxford. The Centre developed the sophisticated technology that supports the project. No manuscripts exist for Austen’s most famous novels, such as Sense and Sensibility and Pride and Prejudice. These appear to have been routinely destroyed once set in print. ‘But we do have Austen’s juvenile writings; parts of the novel Persuasion; and some experimental novels,’ says Professor Sutherland. ‘We also have the manuscript for her novel Sanditon, which she was writing during her final illness.

Clicking with Jane Austen

Jane Austen enters the digital age

‘The manuscripts were originally held in a single collection by Jane’s sister Cassandra. However, at Cassandra’s death in 1845, they were dispersed, first among the Austen family and subsequently into museums and private collections across the world, so the collection hasn’t been viewed as a whole for over 150 years. But now, the manuscripts have been reunited online for the benefit of scholars and the public alike.’ www.janeausten.ac.uk.

Visit www.kclsu.org to find out more and listen in

King’s has been named University of the Year by The Sunday Times. The College was praised for its collaborative education approach – citing teaching and research partnerships with institutions around the planet – and for its emphasis on service, such as delivering healthcare to several poorer London neighbourhoods. The Sunday Times also ranked the College 10th in its annual UK University Guide. This news came only days after the internationally recognised QS University Rankings placed King’s 21st in its chart of the world’s top institutions of higher education. These are the

King’s now has its own radio station, thanks to a supporters of the Annual Fund. Currently in a soft launch phase, it’s broadcasting over the internet at various times of the day, prior to offering a 24-hour service from January 2011. It’s already generating a buzz among the student population: at the last Freshers’ Fair, some 500 registered their interest to become involved. Offering experience that could be vital to a future career in brodcasting is a key goal for the nascent station, along with providing entertainment and information for King’s students and affiliates (including alumni), and boosting communication, particularly with KCLSU. A radio station has been suggested by students for years, but has never come about – until now. This time, the idea had a solid foundation in the shape of weekly podcasts put together by students and posted for download on the KCLSU website. The varied content includes music, discussions on politics, College and local issues, and interviews, for example with the Principal, and Jeremy Paxman – quite a coup. The new station is likely to offer a similar mix. Working with KCLSU President Ryan Wain, who sits on the Annual Fund Development Committee, a student group led by James Owers put together a proposal asking for £19,500, which was also backed by the Principal. The amount was underwritten in full by the Fund, allowing a ‘derelict room’ in the Chesham to be transformed into a state-ofthe-art studio. ‘Everyone is being trained up, so that it will be flawless when the full service begins in January,’ says Ryan. ‘The Fund has been fantastic. The idea behind it, of alumni giving back to student projects, encapsulates what King’s is all about: a natural progression from student to alumni, and creating a relationship between the two.’ autumn 2010 IN TOUCH

Update Lost library treasures discovered

New rapid brain scan accurately diagnoses autism

King’s is exploring an ‘Aladdin’s cave’ of 60,000 historical library items

Watercolour of Scarborough, Tobago, from one of the Collection’s manuscripts

King’s Institute of Psychiatry has developed a pioneering new method of diagnosing autism. For the first time, a quick brain scan can identify adult sufferers with over 90 per cent accuracy. The method uses an MRI scanner to create 3D brain images that can be assessed for structure, shape and thickness – all measurements that reveal autism. It could lead to the screening for autism spectrum disorders in children in the future. ‘The value of this new tool is immense,’ says Dr Christine Ecker, a Lecturer from the IoP who led the study. ‘It could help to alleviate the need for the emotional, time consuming and expensive process which patients currently have to endure.’

catalogued, around a fifth appear to be unique. Highlights so far include a copy of the first published account of Captain Cook’s 1770 expedition to Australia, apparently annotated by a crew member; a copy of Winston Churchill’s 1922 valedictory letter to Colonial Office staff when he lost the post of Colonial Secretary; and a copy of a secret intelligence document produced in 1916 with the help of TE Lawrence. Many more unique items are expected to be discovered, and King’s has launched a £650,000 campaign to make this material accessible to the public.

Genetic impact of bullying

Financial Maths appointment

Researchers at the Institute of Psychiatry at King’s and Duke University (US) have discovered a genetic variation that moderates whether victims of bullying will go on to develop emotional problems. Study into such gene and environment interactions is a burgeoning scientific area. ‘Our research could lead to public health interventions, for example greater efforts to decrease bullying, that may lower the prevalence of child psychopathology,’ concluded the IoP’s Dr Karen Sugden.

The School of Physical Sciences & Engineering at King’s has appointed Dr Damiano Brigo to the Gilbart Chair of Financial Mathematics. Dr Brigo is currently Visiting Professor of Mathematical Finance at Imperial College and Managing Director and Global Head of the Quantitative Innovation team at Fitch Solutions. His interests include valuation and pricing, credit and default modelling, and risk measurement – all key to understanding

the cause of the recent financial meltdown – and his latest book is Credit Models and the Crisis.

and to cap it all, he received a CBE in the Birthday Honours for services to music.

Ahead of the composition

New portal shames state crime

This is a memorable year for George Benjamin, Henry Purcell Professor of Composition at King’s and one of the oustanding composers of his generation. He was the featured contemporary composer at the annual Aldeburgh Festival, the Music Director of the 2010 Ojai Music Festival in California, his Duet for piano and orchestra recently premiered at the BBC Proms,

The International State Crime Initiative has been launched at King’s. A joint venture with the University of Hull and the Harvard Humanitarian Initiative, it creates a single web forum where reports of state crimes around the world can be collected, monitored and discussed. Its first Honorary Fellow is Noam Chomsky, Professor of Linguistics at MIT and one of the world’s leading intellectuals. www.statecrime.org

Thousands of rare books, state documents and treaties are being unearthed as a unique collection formerly used by diplomats and civil servants is catalogued and conserved at King’s. The magnificent Foreign & Commonwealth Office Historical Library Collection, described by historian Andrew Roberts as an ‘Aladdin’s cave’, was acquired by King’s in 2007. It includes some 60,000 items, the oldest of which dates from 1513. Its content spans much of the world, relating to exploration, international affairs, natural resources, defence and security issues, politics and trade. Of the 11,500 items already

Reggie’s round-up

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autumn 2010

It started here

The seismograph

Earthquakes were first accurately measured by a device invented by King’s alumnus John Milne

John ‘Earthquake’ Milne felt the ground tremble for the first time on the very day of his arrival in Japan in 1876. It was a defining moment for the 26 year old, who had been interested in geology ever since his childhood in Rochdale, and had already travelled widely in its study. After leaving the Department of Applied Sciences at King’s with an excellent academic record in 1867, he went to Iceland to study geysers and the Mount Hekla volcano, and then to Newfoundland and Labrador to report on mineral resources. He also joined an expedition to the Sinai Peninsular. He came to Japan after being appointed to the staff of Tokyo’s new Imperial College of Engineering and made the journey overland via Scandinavia, Russia, Mongolia and China, leaving a vivid description of his six-month trek. He taught mining, chemistry and metallurgy, and made a thorough study of Japan’s volcanoes, before his nascent interest in seismology was focused

by the devastating 1880 Yokohama quake, which shook his house. His subsequent investigations led him to realise the inadequacy of the measuring methods then available. Together with his colleagues Thomas Gray and James Ewing, he began a course of research culminating in the construction in 1896 of the first seismograph, using photographic paper rotated by a drum. Seismology thus acquired a sound scientific and mathematical basis. Distances from epicentres could be calculated, the complex nature of wave motion investigated and the possibility of giving warning was first opened up. The Nobi earthquake of 1891 helped to convince Milne that quakes were caused by the release of strain energy which had been stored in rock through the slow deformation of the Earth’s crust. He and his colleague WK Burton described this quake in The Great Earthquake of Japan, 1891 and illustrated it graphically with 30 plates taken by Kazumasa Ogawa. Milne also established a seismic survey of Japan with some 968

Milne’s pioneering work put seismology on a sound scientific basis and opened up the possibility of giving early warning of quakes

stations, and developed advice on building in an earthquake zone. In 1895 Milne left Japan with a generous pension and the rare honour (for foreigners) of the Order of the Rising Sun (third grade). He settled with his Japanese wife Tone on the Isle of Wight. He went on to establish a seismic survey of the world, encourage the establishment of seismic stations internationally, write various books and papers on seismology, and, with his assistant Shinobu Hirota, co-ordinate reports of all the earthquakes recorded. The importance of Milne’s work was recognised as early as 1881 by an Honorary Fellowship of King’s; many more honours followed. He also wrote a number of science-based fiction stories and a best-selling humorous travel book. Isle of Wight locals remembered him as a kindly, squat old gentleman with a slight stoop and a bushy moustache with a gap burned in it by numerous cigarettes. autumn 2010 IN TOUCH

Update

Living life on the edge

The true meaning of Domesday A new King’s project unlocks the secrets of William the Conqueror’s great land survey

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‘Ever wondered who owned your town or village at the time of the Norman conquest? It’s now possible to find out at the flick of a button. And having done so, you can create maps and tables of the estates held by the same lords elsewhere in England. Results are delivered quickly, and the scale of the dispossession of the English by Norman billionaire-like barons comes vividly to life.’ So says Dr Stephen Baxter, a Reader in Medieval History at King’s, of PASE Domesday, the first database of Domesday Book linked to mapping resources to be made freely available online. It breaks new ground in humanities computing and could transform the study of Domesday Book and our understanding of English society before and after the Norman Conquest. The new tool forms part of ‘The Prosopography of AngloSaxon England’ (PASE), a decade-long project by the Department of History and the Centre for Computing in the Humanities at King’s, and the Department of Anglo-Saxon, Norse and Celtic at the University of Cambridge. It aims to capture information relating to all the recorded inhabitants of

Dr Baxter with a copy of Domesday; not a tax survey, he says, but an instrument of repression

England from the late sixth to the late eleventh century, based on examination of all the available written sources for the period. ‘It may seem astonishing that this has never been done before,’ says Dr Baxter. ‘Domesday Book is the most complete survey of any medieval landed society. It has been intensively studied, but until now progress has been blocked [due to] the way pre-Conquest landholders are recorded.’ PASE Domesday changes that. ‘Constructing this database has been quite an exercise, but it is a phenomenally useful research tool. It’s now possible for anyone to do in a few seconds what it has taken scholars weeks to achieve in the past.’ PASE Domesday featured in the BBC ‘Domesday’ special, written and presented by Dr Baxter, which revealed why it was commissioned. Rejecting the conventional view that Domesday was a tax register, Dr Baxter believes it to be an instrument of repression; a record of the dispossession of the English ‘to assert the seamless moment of transition to the new order’. www.domesday.pase.ac.uk

Red One (£19.99 hardback, Weidenfeld & Nicolson) is the first book by War Studies student Kevin Ivison, the son of a soldier who was himself commissioned at 19. A memoir of his time as a counter-terrorist bomb disposal operator in Iraq, it focuses on a single action following the deaths of two of his colleagues due to an Improvised Explosive Device. He was called in to defuse a second, deadlier bomb, just a hundred yards away whilst under fire from snipers and a crowd of angry people. He was awarded the George Medal for this gallantry. Duke Ellington’s America (£26 hardback, Chicago University Press) by Dr Harvey Cohen, from King’s Centre for Culture, Media and Creative Industries, paints a vivid picture of the jazz giant. Mining extensive archives, many never before available, plus new interviews with friends, family, band members, and business associates, Harvey illuminates Ellington’s evolving approach to composition and performance, as well as issues of race, equality, and religion. London 33 East and West (£15 paperback, Glasshouse Books) is a matched pair of anthologies, with a total of 33 new short stories, each one set in a different London borough and written by a different writer, some established, some up and coming; 16 in the East collection, which includes ‘Nne Biko’ by Uchenna Izundu (Law, 2000), a moody tale of ambition written partly in local dialect; and 17 in the West. A nice idea, nicely executed.

King’s musicologist Professor John Deathridge made a thoughtprovoking contribution to a BBC radio debate on the provenance of ‘sonic branding’, aka jingles, such as Nokia’s ringtone or Intel’s four-note bongs. The first popular practitioner, he argues, was Wagner, who used the power of the miniature musical motif to identify characters, plots and objects in the Ring cycle. ‘These tiny themes, which became known as leitmotifs, changed the face of opera, if not music as a whole because a lot of composers wanted their music to mean something in a public sense,’ said Professor Deathridge, emphasising the debt owed to it by branders. ‘The principle is basically the same.’

enrich the lives of inner-city children outside the classroom’. Later, when it was up and running, he found that ‘working with these children was giving me insights… that were meat the birth of War Horse and drink to me as a writer’. Michael Morpurgo FKC AKC It was also in Devon that he (King’s French & English, 1967) met poets Sean Rafferty and Ted Poremque niment perum a ditinlacest dolo vid estiis ditemol oriatiosto moluptus corum fuga.who Ut ese wrote movingly the ate Observer Hughes, ‘a near neighbour’ about how he and his wife set up a he met ‘by chance one evening charity, Farms for City Children, down by the river, which borders on a small Devon estate in 1974. the farm.’ It was through contact He had just started as a writer, with the poets and children that while continuing to work as an he fulfilled a long ambition to ‘enthusiastic teacher’ who write about the First World nevertheless suffered from War. The result was a tale ‘of ‘disillusion and disappointment’ the universal suffering of that dreadful war, seen through the that ‘so many children were eyes of a horse’. That story was, simply passing through the system’ without benefit. The idea of course, War Horse – and the rest is history. Richard Wagner, master of the prototype jingle of his charity was to find ‘a way to

Alumni and staff explore the origins and deeper meaning of jingles, war horses and hummus

the original ring tones

King’s in the media

Arts and humanities investment Three exiting new plans and partnership are boosting the College’s School of Arts and Humanities. First, the Centre for Hellenic Studies is to be enhanced by significantly broadening the scope of its activities to include for the first time teaching as well as research. The Centre will be focused on the

A new outlook for Hellenic Studies

Koraes Chair of Modern Greek and Byzantine History, Language and Literature, which was inaugurated in 1919. Second, a new partnership with the Instituto Camões will establish a Centre at the College that promotes the teaching and knowledge of Portuguese language and culture. Finally, King’s is establishing a Chair in Palaeography and Manuscript Studies. It will be fully endowed through philanthropic monies and will work closely with the Centre for Computing in the Humanities.

Chickpeas with everything

‘In the big debate between Israelis and Arabs, hummus is often a source of disagreement,’ said Dr Ahron Bregman, an Israeli lecturer in War Studies at King’s, in a piece exploring who invented the chickpea paste in America’s Metro International. The debate has almost become a metaphor for the Middle East, with Lebanese, Israelis and Palestinians all claiming hummus as their own. Dr Bregman recalls serving on a Middle East panel. ‘I said, as a goodwill gesture, that not all is bad between Israelis and Palestinians. We both love hummus. My Palestinian colleague, a very nice man, shot back “but you agree, don’t you, that we invented it?”.’

A one in a million gift An alumna has made the College a very generous gift in her will. Diana Trebble (née Jennings, Guy’s, Dentistry, 1953) sadly passed away in February 2009, leaving two-thirds of her estate, equating to just over £1 million, to be used for dental research. This gift will be used to create an open scholarship for postgraduate dental students, called the ‘Diana Trebble PhD Scholarship’. autumn 2010 IN TOUCH

Genius at work

Ludwig Wittgenstein may have been a brilliant philosopher, but he was only a so-so porter at Guy’s

Arguably the finest philosopher of the 20th century, Ludwig Wittgenstein (1889-1951) was described by his mentor Betrand Russell as ‘the most perfect example I have ever known of genius as traditionally conceived, passionate, profound, intense, and dominating’. During the Second World War, that genius was voluntarily applied to the humble task of portering at Guy’s Hospital – a little-known fact that he kept private, and remained a secret until the late 1950s. He came to Guy’s from Austria by way of the University of Manchester, where he studied engineering, and the University of Cambridge, where he studied philosophy under Russell. After fighting for Austria in the First World War he published his Tractatus Logico-philosophicus in 1921, and in 1929 returned to Cambridge as a University lecturer and fellow of Trinity College. Small and slender and as a young man unusually goodlooking, his personal charisma was overwhelming. He spoke English without any accent, gesturing expressively. He was a brilliant lecturer but when the blitz began he was keen to be ‘where the bombs are falling’, and he began work at Guy’s in September 1941. He was employed first as an orderly, taking drugs to the wards (where, however, he advised the

Update

A porter on guard at Guy’s in 1943; substitute magazines and this could be Wittgenstein

patients not to take them). Later he was a laboratory assistant, mixing dermatology ointments. He slept at Nuffield House in a room bare except for the stacks of detective magazines he loved. The director of the Guy’s Pharmacy recalled: ‘After working here three weeks he came and explained how we should be running the place.’ It’s said that when he had to undergo a gallstone operation, Wittgenstein had such mistrust of English doctors that he asked to stay conscious, with mirrors arranged to observe the procedure. At Guy’s Wittgenstein met Drs Roland Grant and Basil Reeve, who were working on ‘wound shock’. There was no general agreement on the symptoms of

‘shock’, and he dissuaded the researchers from using the word. When the blitz ended, he moved with Grant and Reeve to the Royal Victoria Infirmary, Newcastle and left Guy’s in 1943. In 1944 Wittgenstein returned to Cambridge, but resigned his chair in 1947. He died in 1951 of prostate cancer. His Philosophical Investigations was published in 1953 and hailed by some as a work of genius, although others reacted with bafflement. Writing to a former dispensary colleague in 1950 Wittgenstein commented ironically that he didn’t suppose ‘they are erecting a huge statue of me in front of Nuffield House? …Of course, no monument of stone could really show what a wonderful person I am.’

talent on the African continent, has been officially launched in Nairobi, Kenya. Operating as a collaboration between King’s and University of Nairobi, the ALC will offer potential young leaders a programme of study and practical experience built around the themes of peace, security, and development, enabling them to transform policy on the continent at national, subregional and regional level.

Clean air app

Reggie’s round-up Palliative care first

The world’s first institute of palliative care was formally launched in May by HRH The Princess Royal, Chancellor of the University of London. The Cicely Saunders Institute of Palliative Care at the King’s Denmark Hill Campus is a world-class research, teaching and care institute which will work to improve the way in which care is given to the dying. It brings together clinicians,

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autumn 2010

educators and researchers, together with facilities for patients and carers in a partnership with Cicely Saunders International. (See page 59 for ‘This I’ve learned’ with the Institute’s Director, Professor Irene Higginson.) ALC launches

The African Leadership Centre (ALC), a unique centre that will nurture young leadership

The Environmental Research Group at King’s has launched a new iPhone application which displays the latest air pollution levels recorded at over 100 monitoring sites in the London Air Quality Network across the capital. The London Air iPhone app 2.0 has new features such as Maps, My Sites and Push Notifications – a first for helping users keep up to date with air quality in real time.

Foresight

Professor Anthony Pereira, Director of the new King’s Brazil Insitute, analyses a subtle emerging power that feels its time has come

For more on the Brazil Institute, turn to page 33

Brazil looks like an easy-going, uncomplicated country, but the more you get to know it, the more complex you realise it is. It’s vast; the size of a continent. It straddles the developed/ developing world divide. It has major industries and cities, but it also has rural poverty and tropical diseases that are characteristic of poor countries. In the USA particularly, there’s a tendency to lump it in with the rest of Latin America, rather than seeing it in distinctive terms. That vague view is beginning to change. Brazil is being seen as an emerging power that’s active in foreign policy, notably with India and China, which is now its biggest trade partner. It has become part of an alternative axis. There was a Bric nations conference in Brasilia in April, and that coordination is likely to continue. But its influence is subtle. It has historically been a distinctively peaceful country internationally. It’s non-nuclear. It doesn’t have a scary military, and is not in a part of the world that’s prone to inter-state conflict. Brazilians see themselves as uniquely capable diplomats; they’re natural conciliators. Its attempt to mediate an agreement with Iran and Turkey was a signal that it presents an alternative to the leadership of the USA internationally, and getting a permanent seat on the UN Security Council is very important to them. There is a palpable sense that this is Brazil’s time. As other economies stuttered in the global financial crisis, Brazil showed resilience. As with Beijing in 2008, the Rio Olympics in 2016 is being seen as Brazil’s coming out party on the global stage. Unlike in the US and Europe, there is no apprehension about the future. There is concern about the challenges: deep inequalities, corruption, ineffective policies. But there is a sense that as Brazil emerges as a player internationally, it can get its house in order domestically at the same time. Going to the slums is hard, but it’s important to put the challenges in

photograph by mischa haller

Understanding Brazil

Professor Pereira prepares to fly the Brazilian flag

context. In 1960, 70 per cent of the population was rural; now it’s 80 per cent urban. Tens of millions of people have moved to the cities; any country in the world would have problems absorbing those numbers. But now that migration has stopped, Brazil can make progress, and there will be a continued focus on addressing poverty and inequality going forward. It will take time, but this is understood – that’s a good thing. Voters are less susceptible to a would-be saviour with grand promises. It’s a sign of maturity. The Brazil election is a watershed because it’s the first one without Lula since the end of military rule – he has always been a candidate, and won the last two. But looking ahead, no matter

who wins, there will be continuity, notably on macroecomonic policy and basic public spending. There’s consensus on the economic model now. Brazil has suffered so many traumas in the past with economic plans that went wrong. It has seen extraordinary stability since 1994 – and that’s an achievement they don’t want to throw away. As for the environment, there has been defensiveness about foreigners poking their noses into their affairs. But there is progress, particularly at state government level. Sustainability is in their own self-interest, because of international incentives, plus the scale of the deforestation has been such that it would be catastrophic to continue. autumn 2010 IN TOUCH

Update Two of the most ambitious large-scale human genetics projects ever undertaken have been launched, both involving TwinsUK, a leading twin research group based at King’s. The first is UK10K, which aims to decode the genomes of 10,000 people over the next three years. It is expected to uncover many rare genetic variants that are important in human disease, giving a much deeper picture of genetics that can be applied to other studies both in the UK and around the world. It will involve data from the TwinsUK Registry, one of the richest collections of genotypic and phenotypic information on twins worldwide. The second is Epitwin, which will capture the subtle epigenetic signatures that mark the

Pair of major twin genetics studies launched

Leukaemia vaccine trials under way

The TwinsUK Registry is a world-leading bank of genotypic and phenotypic information on twins

The first patient trials have begun for a vaccine treatment for leukaemia developed by King’s scientists that can be used to stop the disease returning after chemotherapy or bone marrow transplant. Eventually it is hoped that the drug, which activates the body’s own immune system against the leukaemia, could be used to treat other cancer types. Leukaemia is a cancer of the white blood cells and bone marrow which in the UK affects around 7,200 patients a year; around 4,300 die from the disease annually. The first patients to be treated as part of the clinical trial, at King’s College Hospital, have Acute myeloid leukaemia (AML), the most common form of the disease in adults. Even with aggressive treatment half would usually find the disease returns. The study, led by Professors Ghulam Mufti and Farzin Farzaneh and Dr Nicola Hardwick, involves intricate work to develop a man-made virus, and has taken 20 years. The concept is similar to normal vaccines, says Professor Mufti. ‘The immune system is made to see something as foreign and can then destroy it itself. This has the chance to be curative.’

and rare blood disorders such as myelodysplastic syndromes (MDS) and aplastic anaemia. Researchers at the Centre work closely with doctors at King’s College Hospital to ensure that any breakthroughs in diagnosis and treatment benefit

The course draws on top graduate and postgraduate students worldwide, educating and inspiring them to facilitate the development of advanced technologies that will address humanity’s great challenges. Zain, 22, from Hayes in West London, is one of the youngest attending the programme. He set up his first internet company at the age of 15.

Groundbreaking genomics and epigenetics initiatives centre on TwinsUK, King’s leading twin research group

differences between 5,000 twins on a scale and depth never before attempted, providing key therapeutic targets for the development of drug treatments. The project is a collaboration between TwinsUK and BGI, one of the world’s largest genomic organisations headquartered in Shenzhen, China. Epigenetics is the most cutting edge emerging field in genetics, which explores how the actions of genes can be temporarily modified by chemical reactions that may occur either at random or by lifestyle or diet. This effect may last generations. Initially the team will focus on obesity, diabetes, allergies, heart disease, osteoporosis and longevity, but the method can be applied to every common trait or disease.

Reggie’s round-up Cancer Centre of Excellence

The Department of Haematology at King’s has been named as a Centre of Excellence by the national blood cancer charity Leukaemia & Lymphoma Research. The charity has £4 million currently invested in 14 research projects at the Centre, which has been recognised for its world-class research into adult leukaemia

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blood cancer patients across London as soon as possible. Young alumnus future leader

King’s graduate Zain Jaffer (Business Management, 2009) has been selected as one of the world’s top 80 future leaders by Google and NASA and invited to attend an elite course at Silicon Valley’s newly established Singularity University.

King’s recommends

Christian Art THE WILTON DIPTYCH

Anonymous artist, c.1395-9 This treasure would have belonged to a rich owner, to whom it would have disclosed a vision of the relation of earth to heaven every time – book-like – it was opened up. The metaphorical ‘hinge’ that unites the two panels is Christ, who appears twice. He is the infant in the arms of his mother, the Queen of Heaven, on the right, and on the left he is John the Baptist’s ‘Lamb of God’. England’s then King, Richard II, joins two sainted predecessors as new Magi, worshipping the Christ child. Their visit, like the Baptism of Christ by John, is celebrated on the Feast of the Epiphany, and this dazzling picture is just that: an epiphany. THE VIRGIN OF THE ROCKS

Leonardo da Vinci, c.1492-1508 Leonardo began this picture as Columbus was discovering a strange new world, and it’s a strange world in itself: a mysterious and suggestive painting about Mary which has recently been restored. It will receive a lot of attention in 2011, with the full findings of the restorers due to be published then, as well as a new Leonardo catalogue. See it before the rush! It is an entrancing, intense exploration of how beauty unfurls in seemingly barren and unpromising surroundings. Leonardo’s genius plays off the forbidding and the exquisite against each other. THE BAPTISM OF CHRIST

Piero della Francesca, 1450s This supremely poised picture (pictured right) embodies a serenity and simplicity that only a master painter can accomplish. Once again, earth and heaven are bound together: the heavens rendered earthly by

Ben Quash, King’s first ever Professor of Christianity & the Arts, picks his five favourite devotional works from the National Gallery

‘The Wilton Diptych’ opens book-like to reveal this dazzling vision of the relation of earth to heaven

the water of baptism which reflects them (bringing them down to earth); Christ’s feet placed at the point where the reflective surface ends and our eye can discern the earthy bed of the stream. He moves between both, his baptism not a necessity but an act of solidarity with humanity; his flesh the flesh of his fellow man (represented, echoing Christ’s skin tones, by the figure undressing on the right). THE ENTOMBMENT

Dirk Bouts, c.1450-60 Rarely have the modulations of grief been so sensitively and reverently explored as in this picture. Each face registers its own distinct, inner feeling, even as all the bodies are bound in a communion of sorrow. The subdued tones of northern European art suit this meditative picture and its subject matter. I love the fact that the woman whose eyes are not downcast but look fully into the face of Christ, and whose air has more of wonder and even hopeful expectancy than the others, is

Mary Magdalene, the type of the repentant sinner. THE SUPPER AT EMMAUS

Caravaggio, 1601 Caravaggio paints the impossible: dramatic action in motionless images. The energy here is palpable, as it swirls around what at the centre of the picture is really just a still life. He paints ‘the penny dropping’ in the minds of the three men who are gathered around the risen Christ at the moment (eucharistically) he breaks bread for them. The servant is a little behind the others, quizzical, while they – in an outflung arm, a chair being shoved violently backwards, burst the picture plane (just like the fruit bowl transgressing the table’s edge), invading our space, involving us whether we like it or not. ● Professor Quash is the co-ordinator of King’s new MA in Christianity & the Arts. The product of a collaboration between the Theology & Religious Studies department and the National Gallery, the unique course will enable students to work across disciplinary and specialism boundaries, while benefiting from privileged understanding of one of the world’s greatest treasuries of art.

autumn 2010 IN TOUCH

ohn ellis

International man of

mysteries One of the world’s foremost theoretical physicists and a key figure in the development of CERN’s Large Hadron Collider, King’s new Clerk Maxwell Professor discusses life, the universe and everything

It’s going very well. The LHC [see next page] is probably the biggest scientific experiment in history, both in terms of its size and the number of people involved. Its aim is to collide elementary particles of matter at the highest possible energy and rate. That way you can look deep inside matter at rare phenomena that might offer important clues to the way that matter behaves, for example very early on in the development of the universe, and help us to understand how the universe got the way it is today. Think of it as a microscope peering deep inside matter, and a telescope peering back to the very early stages of the universe. The LHC has been working routinely since March at an energy far bigger than anywhere else on earth. We are now cranking up the collision rate – what we call luminosity – so that we can see things that nobody else has seen before. The work at the LHC has been described as the search for a ‘theory of everything’ – even the search for the ‘God particle’. What do you think of such terms?

I don’t like the term God particle because it just confuses people. It was a moniker applied to the Higgs particle, which is very important – I have described it as the Holy Grail of particle physics. But it has got nothing to do with God. As for a theory of everything, this would be a hypothetical theory that would unify all the fundamental forces of nature, combine quantum physics with Einstein’s theory of relativity and so forth. That of course is an 16

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extremely ambitious endeavour. Quite frankly, I don’t think we’re going to get that far in my lifetime. Nevertheless, I believe the LHC will make significant progress, perhaps by revealing some essential components which eventually form part of such a theory. So, for example, conjectures about what physics may lie beyond the Standard Model, such as supersymmetry and extra dimensions in space [see glossary], are key elements in string theory, which is a prime candidate for the theory of everything. Saying yes or no to whether these exist will certainly take us a big step forward – but they wouldn’t be the final answer. We shouldn’t get beyond ourselves and think that the LHC is going to solve all our problems. And what if you don’t find the Higgs Boson? (See glossary)

I strongly expect the Higgs Boson to exist. If it didn’t, that would turn upside down a large number of our theoretical ideas. That would, of course, be extremely stimulating. You might ask, if not Higgs, then what? The primary ideas for replacing Higgs exploit those extra dimensions. I think that if we came back in a year’s time and said, ‘Sorry, no Higgs Boson – extra dimensions!’, that would be much more exciting even than finding the Higgs Boson itself.

in profile John Ellis FRS joins King’s from CERN, the European Laboratory for Particle Physics, where he has held a number of major roles. A pioneer of research at the interface between particle physics and cosmology, he is one of the most-cited theoretical physicists of all time. He has been awarded the Maxwell Medal and the Paul Dirac Prize by the Institute of Physics. He is an Elected Fellow of the Royal Society of London since 1985 and of the Institute of Physics since 1991.

What stage is the LHC at now?

Still at the early stages. I like to compare it to an archaeological dig. There are all these layers; the further down you go, the further you go back in time, to the earlier stages in universe. You start by scraping away the dirt that’s lying on the surface. That’s the first few weeks,

PHOTOGRAPH BY PHIL SAYER

Let’s start with the Large Hadron Collider (LHC). What is it, what does it do – and how is it all going?

exploring general ideas – what particle collisions at unparalleled high energies look like in very general terms. Then you start digging through the layers, rediscovering all the particles of the Standard Model we know and understand, checking that we can reproduce the experimental results that we’ve obtained previously. We’re now at the stage where we’ve rediscovered all the Standard Model particles, including the top quark. Nuclear matter is made up out of six elementary particles called quarks. The sixth one, the top quark, is much heavier than all the others. It’s a milestone if you like. Once past that, anything new is physics beyond the Standard Model. And it hasn’t all been plain sailing – there have been engineering difficulties, plus questions about safety, too, about the danger of us all winking out of existence…

You couldn’t find any physicist or astrophysicist who lost any sleep over that. I think that we’ve been able to provide solid scientific arguments that there is no danger. For billions of years, nature has been bombarding the earth with cosmic rays, some of which are producing collisions at way higher energies than anything we’re going to produce at the LHC. So if there was anything dodgy that was going to be produced at the LHC, we wouldn’t be here to ask the question. But there’s no such thing as bad publicity. We’re accused of destroying the planet, and that just increases the hits on our website! Does the LHC represent the pivotal moment of your career?

Absolutely. I’ve been working on theoretical ideas related to the LHC since 1984. It’s great to think that very soon these ideas will be proved either right or wrong. At some level, whether they are right or wrong is secondary. The important thing is that we will get the answers whether the Higgs Boson, dark matter or extra dimensions exist or not.

new school John Ellis’s appointment is part of a major strategic investment in King’s new School of Natural & Mathematical Sciences. The new School consists of several internationally-recognised areas: Mathematics, Physics and the newly created Department of Informatics comprising Computer Science, Robotics and Telecoms. Professor Ellis is one of a series of prestigious appointments, building a vibrant interdisciplinary research community that works across Departments and with other College groups such as Biomedicine and Health. Professor Ellis takes on the role of Head of the Theoretical Particle Physics and Cosmology Group. The School is headed by Chris Mottershead, Vice-Principal (Research and Innovation).

When did you get interested in physics?

I can trace it back to when I was about 12. I read a lot of books from the public library. The problem was that the interesting fiction books were for adults, and you couldn’t take those out until you were 14. So I borrowed a lot of nonfiction books about science, particularly fundamental physics and astrophysics. At the age of about 15 I decided that what I wanted to do was theoretical physics. I went to Cambridge and studied primarily mathematics, because it’s easier to move from maths to physics rather than the other way around. It’s difficult to pick up advanced mathematics if you haven’t steeped yourself in it at an early age. How was your time at university?

It was an eye-opener. I’d come from a suburb of London. My father was in the insurance business, and my parents weren’t intellectuals at all. There were lots of new influences. I remember going to listen to courses on ancient Greek history, and decided at one stage that I was going to learn Russian – but realised that was going to take up too much time! I got an interest in art movies that I’ve kept up with. That and ancient history are continuing hobbies – the more ancient the better. I think it reflects an interest in getting to the origin of things. On my travels as a physicist I’ve had the opportunity to visit various ancient archaeological sites: Persepolis, the old [Persian] capital burned down by Alexander the Great, and Mohenjo-daro, one of the primary sites of the Indus Valley civilisation, that dates from maybe 2000 years before Christ. 18

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You became Clerk Maxwell Professor of Theoretical Physics at King’s in September. How did that come about?

I’ve been collaborating with people at King’s for quite some time now, in particular Nick Mavromatos, and I’ve been a Visiting Professor since 2005. Next year I reach CERN retirement age, and this provides me with the opportunity to give something back somehow. I’d like to help communicate what it is that we’re doing here, help to get students enthusiastic about science and engineering in general, and physics in particular, and particle physics particularly in particular. I’ll certainly maintain links with CERN, and I hope to make it easier for physicists both young and old from King’s to spend time there. In London as a whole, there are groups of people who are very strong in experimental particle physics, in theoretical astrophysics, and in abstract theories, particularly the King’s Mathematics Department. But they’re not linked together. By discussing what’s discovered at LHC and what that might mean for astrophysics and cosmology, that’s a missing link I hope to provide. Is James Clerk Maxwell a resonant name for you?

It certainly is. I think he’s one of the top three theoretical physicists in recorded history, so it’s a fantastic honour to be sitting in the chair that carries his name. And King’s is the alma mater of Peter Higgs too…

Yes, he was both an undergraduate and a research student at King’s, though he wrote his most famous papers later. In fact, we’re planning an event in this academic year, paying homage to him and making people a bit more aware of his

a glossary of terms by professor ellis The Standard Model

Our basic understanding of matter is defined by something that is rather prosaically called the Standard Model. This is extremely successful. It describes all the experiments conducted at particle accelerators to date, descriptions of magnetism and electricity, nuclear force and physics. It’s great, but it leaves open various questions, such as where the mass of elementary particles comes from [given that, according to the Standard Model, these are created without mass in the Big Bang at the start of the universe]. That’s where Mr Higgs may come in. Nor does it solve some astrophysical problems, such as the nature of dark matter. Astrophysicists tell us that something like 80 per cent of the matter in the universe is some invisible dark stuff that we’ve never detected. The question is whether we can find particles of dark matter in our accelerators. There are other problems that cosmology poses. We know that there is both matter and antimatter. The universe is made of matter, but there is no substantial antimatter. This is another puzzle that the LHC might unlock. These all to some extent need new physics beyond the Standard Model.

Decades in planning and construction, at a cost of some £4.4 billion, the LHC is the biggest accelerator yet built. It resides in a 27km circular tunnel up to 175m beneath the Franco-Swiss border, near Geneva

Extra dimensions The Higgs Boson There are mysterious things called fields that extend through space. The gravitational field of the Sun keeps the Earth rotating around it, for example. These fields vary in different parts of space: the gravitational field is strong close to the Sun, while electromagnetic fields vibrate backwards and forwards, and that’s what we call light and radio waves and so on. The idea is that in addition to those fields, there is another which is absolutely homogenous throughout the

connection with King’s and these exciting developments. Do you know him? What’s he like? He’s a wonderful, quite unassuming, modest, sweet guy. In fact, he’s been quoted as saying that he’s a bit embarrassed about all this fuss that’s made about the Higgs Boson and all the resources that have been put into trying to discover it. What do you do to relax? My wife gets me to potter around in the garden. As for those art movies, my current favourite director, not usually regarded as an art director, is Clint Eastwood. I love the spaghetti westerns, and the Dirty Harry movies – that’s entertainment. But he’s recently produced a number of really interesting movies: Gran Torino, Invictus, the two movies about Iwo Jima. And I have moderately eclectic music tastes. I have the complete collection of Schubert songs, which I put on to relax. And the last CD I put on my home hifi was Concrete Blonde. Google them! What next – what ambitions remain for you? The thing that I really want to see and participate in is the extraction of the new physics from the LHC. The period of the next few years could be the most exciting in experimental physics in my lifetime. Of course, the primary role will be taken by the experimentalists who will actually be discovering new stuff, but presumably they will want some advice on how to interpret what they’re seeing – and I plan to play as full a role in that as I can. The corollary of that is, supposing we discover something and we can figure out what it is – what next? I’d like to help figure out what that might be too.

universe. [And it is by interacting with this field that elementary particles acquire their mass.] Think of a field of snow in the Canadian prairies extending out absolutely flat and featureless in all directions. Now imagine that the universe is full of this ‘cosmic snow’ and you have to cross it. If you’re wearing skis, you can skim across it very fast, without interacting with it at all – that’s like a particle of light, the photon itself, for example. If you are wearing snow shoes, you’ll sink in a little – that’s like a particle with mass, an electron maybe, which travels at less than the speed of light. If you’re wearing ordinary boots, you’ll sink in a lot, and go very slowly – that’s like a very heavy particle, such as a top quark, which travels at much less than the speed of light. So the question is, how do you prove all this is more than pure theory? We know that real snow is made up of snowflakes – that’s a quantum of a snow field, in the same way that a photon particle is a quantum of light. So we want to try to find that ‘cosmic snow flake’, and that’s what we call the Higgs Boson: it’s the quantum of the Higgs ‘snow field’. If we find that particle, it will provide some confirmation that these hypothetical ideas have some correspondence with reality.

The Holy Grail of particle physics

We’re used from school days to Euclidian geometry. There are idealised points and lines: the points are infinitely small and the lines infinitely thin. And that’s a little bit like the way we think of particles and the way they move through space. An electron, for example, so far as we can tell, doesn’t have any intrinsic size, and you can regard it as an idealized Euclidian point. Then, as it moves through space, it moves along a line, and again that line has no thickness. It’s just an idealized Euclidian line. But suppose that line has some thickness, like a line you might draw with a pencil, for example. The idea is that maybe these elementary particles have a finite size too. And if they do, then they would have some sort of internal structure – and this structure may be revealed by the LHC. In fact, my bet is that one of the first experimental results you will hear from the LHC about possible new physics is whether quarks, for example, have internal structure.

autumn 2010 IN TOUCH

After the expenses scandal, it seemed the voters wanted ‘real’ people like me

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A physician and teacher with little political experience, Dr Sarah Wollaston won the UK’s first ever full open primary, and then won the Totnes seat at the General Election. If you’ve ever wondered what it would be like to become an MP, read on…

another

world

‘Keep breathing and it’ll be better in a year!’ That’s what an old hand told Dr Sarah Wollaston (Guy’s, Medicine, 1986) when she asked for survival tips after being ‘completely deluged’ by her new job as MP for Totnes in Devon. ‘Nothing prepares you for it,’ she says, already a little wiser after a few months’ experience. ‘Becoming an MP is a huge change. It’s a job without limits. Even as a doctor, you can eventually clear your in-tray and go home. Being an MP, there’s no possibility of ever getting to the end of it. There are always balls in the air.’ Sarah is proving quite an accomplished juggler, however. She arrived at the House tipped as one to watch after making history last August by winning the UK’s first ever full open primary – a US-style electoral process that gave all voters in the constituency the opportunity to vote for the Conservative candidate, regardless of their own political stamp. The previous incumbent was Anthony Steen, the Tory grandee who resigned amid the expenses scandal after saying that the cause of the popular outrage was ‘jealousy’ of his ‘very, very large house’ – a statement that turned his constituents against him overnight. Sarah had practically no political experience until three years ago. ‘I’d never even been to a political meeting when the call went out for potential MPs from “real” working backgrounds,’ she says. ‘After 16 years working as a GP in rural Devon, I thought I could make a difference and volunteered. It’s been very quick.’ She was widely hailed as a refreshing candidate. Nick Bye, the Torbay mayor who stood against her in the primary, wrote in The Times that her nomination was ‘not a victory for anti-politicians or anti-politics’ but for ‘a different style of politics’. Sarah concurs. ‘The expenses scandal blew up and suddenly it seemed that people like me were what the voters wanted – rather than people who had been through the political sausage machine,’ she says. ‘The majority of MPs still have a political background, but a significant number of us now don’t.’ Nevertheless, as Bye observed of her performance in the Totnes primary, she displayed ‘superb political instincts’ from the start. Some swiftly tipped her as a future health minister. She went on to win the Totnes seat with a majority of 4,927. Now she’s a backbencher, ‘a relatively small cog’ in the political machine, she says. ‘But there are opportunities to

contribute on a variety of issues. If you have a background in health, for example, you’re much more likely to be called to speak on health issues. My goal was to get on the Health Select Committee – and I’ve achieved that, so it shows that you can have influence.’ Sarah’s health background spans both medicine and teaching. ‘I started out to train as a paediatrician then became a GP. I became involved in training medical students and junior doctors, and became an Examiner at the Royal College of General Practitioners.’ She is married to a psychiatrist and is a mother of three children, one at university and two at state schools in Torbay. She looks back at her time at Guy’s ‘with great affection’, she says. ‘I had a wonderful time. My favourite memory is a sense of belonging, that I knew everyone in my year. It was a very personal and special place. My daughter is a medical student now, and some of the huge schools today seem to have lost that personal touch. The tutor I remember most fondly is Bob Knight. He was a physician at Guy’s – one of the last great general physicians. There was just something about the way he dealt with everything; the way he taught; his way with patients. He had a lovely sense of humour: he made everything such fun, and all the students wanted to be on his “firm”. He was inspirational. ‘I think universities today are phenomenally important, not only because they provide such a huge resource in research capability, but because they’re training the leaders of tomorrow. On that note, I would definitely encourage scientists to come forward to become MPs. There are plenty of lawyers, and people from PR and politics, but very few with a scientific or healthcare background. We’re desperately short of them.’ And what of that work-load? What is it all? ‘There is the issue-based work that you expect – the white papers, health issues and so on – but constituency work is really high volume too. You’re contacted every day about everything from seagull attacks and complex health questions to neighbourhood disputes. Plus you’re an employer, so there’s all that paperwork too. Managing time is the biggest challenge. But it’s fascinating. You learn on the job and keep asking questions. If you’re an information junkie, this is the job for you!’ autumn 2010 IN TOUCH

ÂŠ getty images

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autumn 2010

At home with

WS Gilbert Next year marks the centenary of the death of librettist WS Gilbert (King’s, Law, 1857) whose partnership with Arthur Sullivan produced the most popular and enduring works in the history of musical theatre. In celebration of his life and remarkable legacy, here is an interview with the man himself Mr Gilbert lives in a little land of his own. There is nothing wanting to complete his miniature kingdom at Graeme’s Dyke, Harrow Weald. With 110 acres at his disposal, the most brilliant writer of satire of the day has laid down two miles of paths, which wend their way through banks of moss and ferns, avenues of chestnut trees and secluded valleys. The roofs of the vineries are heavy with great bunches; flowers are everywhere, and the bee hives, green little wooden dwellings, with the bees crowding in and out, are pointed out by their owner as looking very much like small country theatres doing a ‘tremendous booking’. The house is from every aspect architecturally very fine. Many portions of it are entirely covered with ivy – the entrance porch is surrounded by the clinging tendrils. Here I met Mr Gilbert. He is tall, stalwart, and handsome. He appears strong, and he is; he looks determined. He frankly admits that this characteristic has led success to him and him to success. His hair is grey, but the vigour of a young man is there. To hear him talk is to listen to the merry stream of satire which runs through his verse and lyrics. Over the mantelpiece in the entrance hall is a fine specimen of 14th-century alabaster. By the window is the

WS Gilbert gave this interview 10 years before he died, age 74, of heart failure while trying to save a lady from drowning. Alas, little is known of his time at King’s, other than that he was Secretary of the Science Society, which he characteristically turned into a Shakespearean reading group

model of a man-of-war, 16 feet in length. It is perfect in every detail, and a portion of it was specially constructed as a model of the set of the scene in HMS Pinafore. The parrot in the corner is considered to be the finest talker in England. It can whistle a hornpipe, and, if put to the test, could probably rattle off one of its master’s patter songs. The library – where we sit together talking – opens out on to the lawn, and its white enamel bookcases contain close upon 4000 volumes. It is post time, and he has just finished the libretto of his new comic opera. He weighs the envelope in his hand, and, after the servant has left the room, he flings himself into his favourite chair, and remarks, ‘There goes something that will either bring me in twenty thousand pounds or twenty thousand pence!’ The chair is of red leather, and he has used the same size and pattern for a quarter of a century. He takes it with him wherever he goes, for he never writes at a desk. When working he sits here with a stool exactly the same height, and stretching himself on these, he writes on a pad on his lap. ‘My life? Date of birth, November 18, 1836. Birthplace, 17, Southampton-street, Strand, in the house of my grandfather, who had known Johnson, Garrick, and

partner in rhyme

Gilbert was already writing successfully in print and for the stage when he met Arthur Sullivan. Their first work, The Sorcerer, was successful; their second, HMS Pinafore, was a phenomenon, as were The Pirates of Penzance, The Mikado and The Yeomen of the Guard. Gilbert revolutionised the libretto, and his quick wit, meticulous plots and perfect rhythmic and rhyming structures became a lasting model for musical comedy: Cole Porter, Irving Berlin, Oscar Hammerstein, Stephen Sondheim and many more cited his influence.

autumn 2010 IN TOUCH

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autumn 2010

a woman or vice versa. My first meeting with Sullivan was rather amusing. I was busy on my Palace of Truth, in which there is a character, one Zoram, who is a musical imposter. I was bound to make Zoram express his musical ideas in technical language, so I took up my Encyclopaedia Britannica, and, turning to the word “Harmony”, selected a suitable sentence and turned into sounding blank verse. ‘Curious to know whether this would pass muster with a musician, I said to Sullivan, to whom I had just been introduced, “I am very pleased to meet you, because you will be able to settle a question which has just arisen. My contention is that when a musician who is master of many instruments has a musical theme to express, he can express it as perfectly upon the simple tetrachord of Mercury (in which there are, as we all know, no diatonic intervals whatever) as upon the more elaborate disdiapason (with the familiar four tetrachords and the redundant note) which (I need not remind you) embraces in its simple consonance all the single, double, and inverted chords.” ‘He reflected for a moment, and asked me to oblige him by repeating my question. I did so, and he replied that it was a nice point, and he would like to think it over before giving a definite reply. That took place about 20 years ago, and I believe he is still hammering it out.’ Not the least interesting part of my day with Mr Gilbert was in having his methods of working explained. He has an exact model of the stage made to half-inch scale, showing every entrance and exit, exactly as the scene will appear at the theatre. Little blocks of wood are made representing men and women – the men are three inches high, and the women two and a half inches. These blocks are painted in various colours to show the different voices. The green and white striped blocks may be ‘tenors’; the black and yellow ‘sopranos’; the red and green ‘contraltos’; and so on. With this before him, Mr Gilbert works out every single position of his characters, giving them their proper places on the model stage, and he is thus enabled to go down to rehearsal prepared to indicate to every principal and chorister his proper place in the scene under consideration. His subjects are often the outcome of pure accident. The Mikado was suggested by a huge Japanese executioner’s sword which is hung in his library. The Yeomen of the Guard was suggested by the beefeater who serves as an advertisement of the Tower Furnishing Company at Uxbridge Railway Station. A rather curious and certainly unique fact in dramatic authorship, and one that is without precedent in the annals of the stage, is that Mr Gilbert’s name has appeared in the London play bills without a single break for nearly 24 years. Reading rather like a Victorian ‘Hello’ piece, this article appeared in ‘The Strand’ magazine, which ran from 1891 to 1950 and is perhaps best known for its Sherlock Holmes stories. Thanks to David Pim for additional research

The Mikado was suggested by a huge Japanese executioner’s sword hung in the library

Reynolds, and who was the last man in London, I believe, who wore Hessian boots and a pigtail. I went to school in Ealing, presided over by Dr Nicholas – a pedagogue who appears more than once in Thackeray’s pages as “Dr Tickle-us of Great Ealing School”. I was always writing plays for home performance, and at 18 wrote a burlesque in 18 scenes. This was offered to every manager in London, and unanimously rejected. I couldn’t understand why at the time – I do now. ‘I was intended for the Royal Artillery, and read up during the Crimean War. Of course, it came to an end just as I was prepared to go up for examination. I was clerk in the Privy Council for five miserable years, took my BA degree at King’s College at the London University, and was called to the bar of the Inner Temple in 1863. I was at the bar four years, and am now very reservedly raised to the Bench – but only as a Justice of the Peace. ‘I was not fortunate in my clients. I well remember my first brief, which was purely honorary. I am a tolerably good French scholar, and was employed to interpret and translate the conversations and letters between attorney, leading counsel, and client – a Parisian. The Frenchman, who was a short, stout man, won his case, and he looked upon me as having done it all. He met me in the hall, and, rushing up to me, threw his arms round my neck and kissed me on both cheeks. That was my first fee. ‘On another occasion I defended an old lady who was accused of picking pockets. On the conclusion of my impassioned speech for the defence, she took off a heavy boot and threw it at my head. That was my second fee. ‘My first play was Dulcamara, produced at the St James’s Theatre by Miss Herbert. I wrote it in ten days, rehearsed it a week; it ran five months, and has been twice revived. No arrangement was made about the price, and after it had been produced Mr Emden, Miss Herbert’s manager, asked me how much I expected. I reckoned it out at three guineas a day, and replied, “Thirty guineas”. “Oh!” said Emden, “we don’t deal in guineas, say pounds.” I was quite satisfied with the price and took his cheque. Then Emden quietly turned to me and said: “Take my advice as an old stager. Never sell as good a piece as this for £30 again.” I took his advice; I never have. ‘My operatic work has been singularly successful – owing largely, of course, to the invaluable co-operation of Sir Arthur Sullivan. When Sullivan and I first determined to work together, the burlesque stage was in a very unclean state. We made up our minds to do all in our power to wipe out the grosser element, never to let an offending word escape our characters, and never allow a man to appear as

One of theatre’s most oft-performed works, The Mikado is a prime example of what film director Mike Leigh calls Gilbert’s ‘topsy turvy’ talent for telling ‘a perfectly outrageous story in a completely deadpan way’

ÂŠ getty images

autumn 2010 IN TOUCH

It may have happened some 25 years ago, but David Barker CBE (Guy’s, Medicine, 1962) can still remember the exact moment when the theory that defines his life’s work fell into place. It was a Saturday, and he was poring over maps of Lincolnshire that married modern incidence of heart disease with records of infant mortality from 50 years before. ‘It was an incredibly close fit,’ he says. His work as a physician and epidemiologist at the University of Southampton had already led him to doubt the conventional medical view that heart disease is caused by loose living– too much fatty food, too many cigarettes, too little exercise. These maps showed a different link: a direct correlation between infant and adult vulnerability. And then came the eureka moment. ‘I just twigged it,’ he says. It was lifestyle that was disposing these people to disease after all – but not theirs. It was the lifestyle of their mothers. That epiphany led to the development of the Barker Hypothesis: that people with low birth weight, the result of poor nutrition in the womb, are at greater risk of developing heart disease. Barker has since applied his pre-birth theory to other chronic diseases, notably type 2 diabetes, hypertension and stroke. His years of painstaking research is a remarkable story that mixes social history, statistics, biology and more in an international hunt for clues that smacks just a little of Dan Brown. Did it feel like that at the time? ‘Absolutely,’ says Barker. ‘It’s been quite a ride.’ And a turbulent one too. His theory was frowned upon for years – and still is by some. ‘People were terrible,’ he says. It was a kind of heresy, challenging the view that heart disease is essentially self-inflicted, and that by modifying behaviour in adulthood you can stay healthy. Barker’s is a much more subtle, complex message: that you have to improve the nutrition of babies in the womb, and that this requires improvement in the lifetime nutrition of girls and young women, rather than simply improving the diets of mothers during pregnancy. It requires the kind of

long-term view that is traditionally anathema to politicians, who demand quick fixes. But Barker has grounds for optimism. Climate change, with its extended time horizon, has made a big difference to political thinking, he believes. And something has to give, he says, otherwise the rising epidemics of chronic disease, particularly type 2 diabetes, will bring healthcare to its knees. ‘There are 250 million people in the world with diabetes now. We’re not winning the war, we’re losing it.’ Barker’s medical career began in the 1950s, at what he calls ‘the end of the old-fashioned Guy’s’, when consultants were authoritarian and not unlike the James Robertson Justice caricature. A rare exception was John Butterfield, later Lord Butterfield, Guy’s first Professor of Experimental Medicine. ‘I worked for him as a junior doctor. He was younger, part of the new generation, and a breath of fresh air. He was a wonderful man: inspirational, sociable and friendly.’ He resonated with the interns, who were full of optimism for the still young NHS. ‘Nobody minded working phenomenal hours. I worked for 12 days and nights – and wasn’t allowed to leave – then had two days off. And I was Dr Barker in the Archive in the MRC Unit at Southampton General Hospital. It was built to house the Hertfordshire birth records that were the seminal source of information for subsequent work on the pre-birth origin of disease

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PHOTOGRAPHY BY SUKI DHANDA

Dr David Barker’s pioneering research sparked decades of controversy over the foetal origin of chronic disease

married with kids! But you didn’t mind. It was what you wanted to do: you become a doctor to see patients, and get up in the night and do all the heroics. It was great fun.’ Barker always planned to do research, but he learned from Butterfield that he could be a doctor too. ‘He ran a research empire but was also a clinician – that is the fantastic life,’ he says. He got his interest in epidemiology from Butterfield too, and published a paper on the subject when he was still at Guy’s. It appealed because of a long interest in natural history. ‘Epidemiology is about where diseases occur and who gets them – there’s a lot of biology in that.’ Its high point in the past was sorting out infectious and vitamin diseases. ‘Realising that yellow fever was carried by mosquitoes was a brilliant piece of epidemiology and led immediately to the cessation of epidemics. It wiped it out in some places even before people knew it was caused by a virus.’ That point about not needing to know the underlying cause of a problem in order to fix it remains fundamental to Barker. He is dismissive of genetics, which he feels has offered plenty of detail, but no practical fixes. He is a man with strong views, and a potent conviction that has driven him for decades. His work has steadily become widely recognised, earning him many international awards. He has been elected an FRS, and he was made a CBE in 2005. He remains driven and is passionate that his field needs to attract more young people because so much more still needs to be done. ‘I’m 72 now and I can’t stop,’ he says. He’s the only man he knows who quit playing golf on retirement, because work got busier. He no longer practices or heads up the MRC department at Southampton, where he has been ever since helping set up its medical school in 1972, but his research there continues. It continues too at the Oregon Health and Science University, where he is Professor in the Department of Cardiovascular Medicine. He also has projects in France, Finland and the Netherlands, and a hectic speaking schedule. ‘I’ll just push on,’ he says. ‘I’m terrible at relaxing. I’m lucky to have a high cause. I want to improve the nutrition of girls and young women in order to improve the health of the next generation – who could be against that? It’s a fantastic thing to be part of.’

I’m 72 now and I can’t stop. I’m lucky to have a high cause

autumn 2010 IN TOUCH

Kingâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s new fundraising campaign aims not just to transform the College, but to find solutions to some of the greatest challenges facing the world today. This ÂŁ500 million campaign sets out to provide answers to global questions in three areas of urgent need: neuroscience and mental health, leadership and society, and cancer.

The

world needs answers now 28

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autumn 2010 IN TOUCH

How can we address the problems inside our heads? Connect the study of the mind and brain.

IN TOUCH

autumn 2010

Neuroscience & mental health The brain remains little understood. For many of its conditions, there are few effective treatments. As the population ages, dementia, which already affects 700,000 people in the UK alone, will spiral. Mental illness is on the rise too, now affecting one in four people in the UK alone. A world leader in psychology and psychiatry, King’s is already harnessing the new technical possibilities of neuroscience to reunite the study of the mind and brain, with ground-breaking results. This campaign will allow King’s to do much more: to appoint talented researchers to build on its pioneering work in biomarkers, neuroimaging

and genetics, helping it to deliver new insights and treatments in Alzheimer’s and other conditions. World questions | King’s answers will fund the stateof-the-art Maurice Wohl Clinical Neuroscience Institute, which will be the best of its kind in Europe, bringing together leading clinicians and researchers in the kind of innovation-spurring interdisciplinary environment that King’s does so well. It will drive the search for better treatments of devastating mental illnesses and further our understanding and treatment of conditions such as stroke, epilepsy and Parkinson’s.

The outlook for Alzheimer’s disease is improving. Clinical trials are now well advanced for 10 drugs designed to prevent early pathological changes and another 50 or so are in earlier phases of development. But an outstanding problem is that we cannot diagnose Alzheimer’s early or accurately, or effectively measure its progression. One of the most exciting and fast-moving areas of research in Alzheimer’s is the search for biomarkers – measurable characteristics that reflect the disease’s progress. The most advanced technologies in the hunt

Professor Simon Lovestone, Alzheimer’s

The Maurice Wohl Institute The campaign will finance the completion of the Maurice Wohl Clinical Neurosciences Institute in Denmark Hill and help fund its top people. The institute will bring together 250 researchers in basic and clinical neuroscience, working with

other research and clinical teams to advance personalised treatment for Parkinson’s, dementia, stroke, epilepsy and depression. It aims to cut average development time for new drugs and treatments from 12 years to just six.

£200m Campaign target for Neuroscience and mental health

1,000

Number of King’s researchers studying the human brain

Detecting Alzheimer’s How can we diagnose dementia earlier? Professor Simon Lovestone outlines the pioneering work being carried out by the Institute of Psychiatry.

Vital statistics

are brain scans, either MRI [magnetic resonance imaging] or molecular imaging of pathology using PET [positron emission tomography]. We have been working on a major trial in Europe, partnered with a large US study, to find the best technique for the automated analysis of regional differences in the brain. We can achieve 85 per cent or more accuracy on brain scans: close to the typical accuracy of a clinician using cognitive tests, hitherto the sole option. We have also spent the last eight years or so working on a blood test, which has been described as the ‘holy grail’ of Alzheimer’s research by Rebecca Wood, Chief Executive of the Alzheimer’s Research Trust. We have identified a series of proteins in blood which seem to be different in Alzheimer’s. Specifically, we have just published research in the Archives of General Psychiatry, which shows that blood levels of the protein clusterin could be an early biomarker of the disease, many years before symptoms appear. This is very exciting and is powerful evidence backing up our studies. New investment through this campaign will allow our researchers to continue these trials and speed effective therapies to patients more quickly.

World ranking for King’s research in psychiatry and psychology

World ranking for number of citations in autism study

World ranking for number of citations in mental health generally

25%

UK Medical Research Council centres hosted at King’s (more than any other university)

50%

Stroke victims who will survive 12 months

People diagnosed with Parkinson’s in the UK per day – one an hour

Simon Lovestone is Professor of Old Age Psychiatry and Director of Research at King’s Health Partners Academic Health Sciences Centre. A leading authority in his field, his research portfolio includes clinical trials, molecular genetics, molecular pathophysiology and the search for biomarkers for Alzheimer’s disease. autumn 2010 IN TOUCH

How can we tackle shifts in world power? Shift how we see the world.

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autumn 2010

Leadership & society The world has never changed so quickly. New powers, even superpowers, are emerging. Globalization is interconnecting countries in ways undreamt of a generation ago, providing huge opportunities, but also challenges, including conflict and terrorism. Understanding this complex, dynamic 21st-century landscape is critical. Through World questions | King’s answers, King’s can help provide that understanding. We can become a world leader in world leadership. With expertise second to none in war studies, international law, geography and more, we are already a trusted adviser at the highest level on the

causes of radicalisation and terrorism. King’s works directly with UN weapons inspectors, international war crimes tribunals, the UK military and even space agencies. This campaign will foster international understanding by creating interlocking institutes focused on the new powerhouses of Brazil, China and India. It will help create new pathways to peace by sharing expertise about postconflict societies, beginning with the new African Leadership Centre in Kenya. King’s move into the East Wing of Somerset House will create a new cultural hub for the capital, and a new home for the School of Law.

Vital statistics

£99m

Campaign goal for Leadership and society

1.4bn

Asia’s population, 1950

A new outlook Professor Anthony Pereira outlines the scope of King’s new Brazil Institute, which was officially launched in October. Why a Brazil institute – and why at King’s? Although Brazil is a growing international power, there is currently very little focus on Brazil in British universities or in colleges anywhere, so we are meeting a real need. Also, an interdisciplinary emphasis is very strong at King’s, which is ideal for us. The institute will reach across the College, spanning not just humanities and social sciences, but sciences and public health. We’ll be able to address where, say, Brazil is going in terms of biofuels and how that will impact markets across the globe and ecosystems in South America, and we’ll have people who understand not only the policy and politics, but also the science. We’re building links and

collaborations in Brazil right across the spectrum, and increasing the flow of students both ways. What are your goals? We have a very broad mandate, with five areas: culture and religion; law, justice and human rights; medicine, public health and social policy; the environment; and energy and political economy. We’ll focus as we build, creating groups that go deeper in the areas that emerge as key. Of course, we’re an academic body, so we will be judged on the quality of our research, publications and events and so on, but our work can have an important impact on pressing ‘real’ issues too. Brazil straddles the developing/ developed work divide, so our research can have global benefits, from retro-viral drugs for AIDS to social programmes. To take one example, the public sector in Brazil has real weaknesses they want to

address – areas in which Britain is a leader. So there can be a flow of best practice from one country to another. We can act as an intermediary between universities and the wider world, providing the information and analytical tools that will empower others to make a difference. How will the Brazil institute fit with the new China and India institutes? We’re creating these faculties so that they can all interact together. This allows us to look at these major emerging powers, which are interacting themselves and forming an alternative political axis, in context. Anthony Pereira was recently appointed Professor of Brazilian Studies and Director of King’s Brazil Institute. A political scientist, he has studied, taught and held professorships at Harvard and Tufts University in Boston, among others.

Asia’s population, 2010

44%

Sub-Saharan Africans younger than 15

16%

Europeans younger than 15

1bn

People who lack access to clean drinking water

Children who die annually from preventable diseases

4.7bn

Mobile phone subscriptions worldwide

Somerset House Last December, King’s finally acquired the East Wing of Somerset House, one of London’s most beautiful and iconic buildings, marking the conclusion of what has been described as one of the world’s longest-ever property negotiations, taking some 180 years. It will provide a unique opportunity for London as an arts complex in a building which will bridge the worlds of higher education, policy and the arts. The ground floor will be converted into space for cultural activities open to the public for the first time. There will also be areas for studies in arts and culture and continuing education, and a learning centre. The top two floors of the building will be converted into accommodation for the College’s School of Law, which has enjoyed a tradition of excellence for more than 175 years and is recognised globally as one of Europe’s premier law schools.

4.1bn

Nations with women as head of government

The East Wing (on the left) of Somerset House will provide London with a new cultural hub autumn 2010 IN TOUCH

How can we deliver more accurate cancer care? Create a bespoke treatment for every patient.

IN TOUCH

autumn 2010

Cancer One in three people will suffer from cancer in their lifetime. It takes the lives of seven million people worldwide each year. Yet there has never been greater optimism that it can be prevented, controlled, even cured. Scientific research has accelerated dramatically, thanks to new technology, and insights delivered by the Human Genome Project. This has ushered in a new era of personalised medicine, bringing with it new, targeted therapeutic opportunities. Through this campaign, King’s will become a global leader in the fight against cancer. It already has a worldclass reputation in breast cancer, cancer cell biology,

cancer of the blood and lymph nodes, tumour immunology, epidemiology, imaging and palliative care. Created in 2005, King’s Integrated Cancer Centre (ICC) has rapidly become a pioneer in a new kind of combined care and research model that promises to accelerate the development of treatments significantly. The campaign will allow the ICC to enter phase two, supporting new research teams to identify therapeutic targets and create new personalised treatments. It will fund the new Institute of Experimental Oncology, increasing clinical trials capacity and speeding drug development.

Transforming cancer care Professors Arnie Purushotham and Peter Parker explain how King’s Integrated Cancer Centre is pioneering a new approach to cancer.

What are your recent breakthroughs? Peter: Vaccination in leukaemia is a huge leap forward. Also the early data from our triple negative breast cancer trials looks hugely encouraging. This cancer type is a significant part of the breast cancer diagnoses, some 15 to 20 per cent, but it’s poorly treated because we don’t have the tools to do it. The basic science that's gone into analysing the problem and to convert that into actions in the clinic in the past few years has been phenomenal.

©suki dhanda

Why is cancer part of the campaign? Arnie: It’s a recognition by King’s Health Partners of the importance of cancer in terms of human health. It’s a huge part of what we do in the hospital trusts that deliver services to our community, and a significant part of what the College does in research. Bringing those together is what our Integrated Cancer Centre is all about, and the campaign reflects our belief that we can build on our current strengths to achieve even more. A big part of the context of this is personalised medicine: a fantastic opportunity that’s come out of technology advances, particularly the Human Genome Project and the therapeutic intervention opportunities it has brought. All the targets are there. The challenge is which one to tackle, for which patient – the alignment is crucial. Again, we need to be able to do more of this – and better. The campaign will help us achieve that.

what we want to put into place. Very few places have ever tried anything like this on such a large scale – integrating the work of researchers and doctors. Really, it’s building capacity around the central pipeline of our activity, across the whole pathway from fundamental research to standard clinical care.

Peter Parker (left) and Arnie Purushotham

How does personalised medicine work? Arnie: That breast cancer trial is a great example. We look at what’s wrong, find out what defines a group of patients, analyse and understand the disease drivers and convert that into a programme to generate new therapeutic interventions. Then we take those into early phase trials before we take the interventions to a wider cohort of patients to see if they are effective on a larger scale. Peter: Traditionally, it has taken perhaps 15 years to get an intervention that you think might work into the clinic. We need to shorten that. Part of this will come from the methods employed now to identify good targets and develop interventions, but a substantial element will come from greater insight into the trials we run. How will the campaign help? Arnie: The Experimental Oncology Institute is the core component of

Why is King’s the best place to do this? Peter: We are very good at breast cancer, cancer cell biology, haematooncology, tumour immunology, epidemiology, imaging and palliative care. Those are our significant pillars. We want to build on our position in all those areas, but we’re aware of the additional needs of the population we serve in this area. This reflects needs worldwide, due to its huge ethnic spread – one of our major strengths. Arnie: What’s also extraordinary about this place is the way that it has attracted people who share a vision: that it’s an exchange across the whole pathway that’s important. Integration is not about basic scientists treating patients, or excellent clinicians getting their hands wet in the laboratory. It’s about having a single community working towards one set of goals. There aren’t many places like this in the world. It’s very hard to do unless you start almost with a clean sheet. Arnie Purushotham is Director of the ICC, Head of Research Oncology at King’s and a Consultant Surgeon at Guy’s and St Thomas’. Peter Parker is Deputy Director of the ICC, Head of the Division of Cancer Studies at King’s and Co-Director of the King’s Experimental Cancer Medicine Centre.

Vital statistics

£143m

Campaign goal for cancer

1.7m

South London population covered by King’s Health Partners

12%

King’s Health Partners’ cancer patients entered on trials

30%

Target for cancer patients entered on trials

11%

UK women who develop breast cancer

300%

Research productivity boost expected from new ORIS database

To read the full interview with Arnie & Peter, visit www. alumni.kcl. ac.uk autumn 2010 IN TOUCH

How can King’s help answer the world’s questions? By combining theory, practice and innovation.

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autumn 2010

The campaign explained

How did you choose the three themes for the campaign? A lot of work has been done in the last four or five years about the inevitable trends in the world. This campaign combines some of the most pressing of these trends with King’s greatest strengths. Cancer is a terrible thing, but we’re beginning to understand that the possibility of cures for all, or the ability to live with cancer, is within our grasp. Bringing research into clinical studies or to patients quicker is desperately important. That impacts elsewhere. As people live longer, as we address not just cancer but other diseases, so other things go wrong with the human body – notably the brain. Systemic

Campaign Chairman The Rt Hon Sir John Major KG CH is the Chairman of the campaign. Prime Minister of the UK (1990-97), he is now a much sought after adviser and commentator on international affairs. He has strong personal links with King’s local community, he grew up in South London and his daughter Elizabeth was born at King’s College Hospital. He takes a close interest in each of the three campaign themes.

under-spending on research in this area must now be addressed to accelerate learning within the neuroscience field. A third inevitable trend is globalisation and mass communication: more and more cultures are living and doing things together in ways unimaginable 30 or 40 years ago. Is the world ready for that? We see time and again the tensions that result around the world, notably expressed all too often through terrorism. We can’t rewind the clock, but we can spend a great deal more time and effort researching and understanding the impact of these social and cultural changes.

How to get involved Give a gift today

©phil sayer

World questions | King’s answers is the largest campaign in the history of King’s. It proposes to raise £500 million for the three priority areas, while also investing in the Somerset House project and funding student facilities and opportunities. Rory Tapner (LLB, 1982), Vice-Chairman of the campaign, outlines the thinking behind the campaign.

Campaign Vice-Chairman Rory Tapner

Why is a British university focusing on global questions? The impact of what a British university does isn’t reserved for the UK. And look at the student and PhD population – it’s pretty international. King’s is the ideal place to address these questions. A leading university based in the heart of London: a truly global city; a cultural and ethnic melting pot in the world’s central time zone. The University’s motto ‘In the Service of Society’ now applies to both its global perspective and impact. Why should people give? It’s a way of giving something back. When people have had a successful career, they often want to support the society and institutions that supported them. If you are thinking of making a difference, it’s much easier to make a donation to somewhere that has an emotional attachment, rather than to somewhere that doesn’t. Plus look at the causes – these are not small subjects! These are challenges that touch the lives of people across the planet. There are 120,000 living King’s alumni – an extraordinary number – and I hope each of us is inspired to support this campaign in some manner. What would you say to people who think a university can’t answer world questions? They’re wrong! Just look at the huge amount of medical research resulting

in new drugs and ways of teaching that evolves out of universities. After all, this is where cancer research charities spend a great deal of their research budgets, for example. Plus the breadth and interdisciplinary nature of universities is very difficult to replicate. What other institution, other than a university such as King’s, can bring together the expertise to address all these questions? And what attracted you to King’s? I am an alumnus, which helps! I first agreed to come here as Treasurer three or four years ago, when Rick Trainer had his strategic vision well under way. It felt like a very dynamic place, which was changing and expanding. This campaign reflects all that is great about King’s and its vision for the future. Assuming the campaign is successful, which it will be, King’s will take a further significant step forward. It’s already world renowned, but in the big areas that this campaign addresses, so much more can be done. In addition to his role in the campaign, Rory is the College’s Honorary Treasurer and Chairman of the Financial Committee of Council. A key figure in the banking industry, he was for several years the Chief Executive and Chairman of UBS in Asia, and was recently appointed CEO of RBS Wealth Management – with his new office conveniently located on the Strand.

Q: How could your gift of £18 help to save hundreds of lives every year? A: If everyone gave just £18 – and signed up to Gift Aid and Matched Funding – that would raise over £5 million, enough to cover the cost of new Cancer Treatment Centre Laboratories. Their work will help to find a cure for cancer.

Other ways to get involved Sign up for the •campaign newsletter at www.kcl.ac.uk/ kingsanswers Submit your world questions on the campaign website Spread the word

• •

We face challenging world questions. With your help, we will find the answers. autumn 2010 IN TOUCH

Community

Alumni Weekend 2010

Now in its seventh year, this ever popular event drew some 600 alumni and guests back to campus for another packed programme of events 38

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autumn 2010

‘The only problem is how to cram everything in!’ said an enthusiastic Dr David Allan (Guy’s, Medicine, 1963) of the seventh annual Alumni Weekend. ‘There are so many excellent events on offer.’ It was a widely held view among the 600 alumni and guests from King’s and associated colleges who took the opportunity to re-visit the College and hear about the latest research. As a Friday afternoon curtain-raiser, early attendees enjoyed a variety of events, including visits to Big Ben, Houses of Parliament, Lambeth Palace and Somerset House neighbour, the Courtauld Gallery. ‘I’ve had a lovely

time,’ said Harvey Dodgson (English, 1965). ‘The tour of the Lambeth Palace Library was a real highlight. We got to see a copy of the warrant for the execution of Mary, Queen of Scots!’ In the evening, Baroness Sally Morgan of Huyton (Education, 1981) led a discussion on women in leadership with a distinguished panel that included Dame Judith Mayhew Jonas (Law, 1970) and Professor Janet Walsh from King’s Department of Management. The panel analysed reasons for the continued dearth of female leaders, such as family responsibility and intense media scrutiny, and ultimately recognised the need for women to

encourage and support each other – and that gender bias can and will be broken. Meanwhile, in the Strand Chapel, Director David Trendell, the College organist (also Senior Lecturer in the Music Department), led the choir in a varied programme of 16th- and 17th-century scores that was by turns sensitive, solemn and spiritual. ‘Absolutely incredible,’ said Margaret Delmer (French & Spanish, 1963) at the drinks reception afterwards. On Saturday morning, Tony Gilland, from the Institute of Ideas, chaired a two-part panel discussion with Professor Simon Wessley (Consultant,

Department of Psychological Medicine) and Professor Christopher Shaw (Head of the Department of Clinical Neuroscience). First, it explored the rise in mental illness – the economic recession, plus reduced stigma and celebrity ‘revelations’ encouraging sufferers to come forward were cited – and associated issues; then the signifiance of neuroscience. No real insights yet, said Professor Wessley; ‘knowledge is power’, retorted Professor Shaw. Principal Rick Trainor welcomed 150 guests to the alumni lunch in the Great Hall where several reunion groups celebrated 50 years since their

‘The only problem is how to cram everything in!’ Dr David Allan (Guy’s, Medicine, 1963)

The weekend’s highlights included a typically sensational choir performance, the first ever alumni awards and much cheerful reminiscing

graduation. It was also the setting for the first ever alumni awards: recipients included Susan Hill (English, 1963), named ‘Alumnus/Alumna of the Year’, and Robin Taher (Pharmacology with Management, 2005), who received the ‘Alumni Giving Award’ for his contribution to the College. Afterwards there was a strong turnout for a lively discussion on cancer, led by Professors Peter Parker and Arnie Purushotham. It explored the causes of this most pressing of all diseases, plus the latest research and potential cures such as personalised medicine. ‘Innovative and offered a lot of food for thought,’ said Dr Surendra

Paul (KCSMD, Medicine, 1973). A sunny afternoon tea in the garden rounded off the afternoon perfectly. The final day of events on Sunday welcomed alumni to hear Dr Christine Kenyon Jones (English Literature, PhD, 1999) discuss the recent discovery of Virginia Woolf’s attendance at the King’s Ladies Department. And the Geographers’ Joint School Society led alumni on walks along the north bank of the Thames to seek out some hidden surprises near King’s. ‘A wonderful weekend,’ said Jonella Foster (French & German, 2001). ‘It’s been great to have met up with old friends – and made new ones.’

autumn 2010 IN TOUCH

Events KCLA Dinner and AGM

Law Alumni Reception

Friday 5 November 2010 Strand Campus King’s College London Association will hold its Annual General Meeting, followed by the Annual Dinner, to review the achievements of the past year. Alumnus Anthony Seldon (PGCEA, 1983), one of Britain’s most distinguished political biographers, will be the guest speaker at the dinner, speaking on the subject ‘What makes a Prime Minister?’ Dinner tickets cost £45 or £22.50 for students and new alumni (five years and less since graduation). Book early to avoid disappointment as tickets are expected to sell out. Contact the Alumni Office.

Tuesday 16 November 2010 Butchers’ Hall Principal Rick Trainor, Professor Tim Macklem, members of the Law Alumni Advisory Board, and School of Law staff look forward to welcoming law alumni for this reception in the elegant surroundings of Butchers’ Hall. Contact the Alumni Office.

The Saki Ruth Dockrill Memorial Lecture

Tuesday 9 November 2010 Great Hall, Strand Campus The subject is ‘Why wartime matters: How World War II is shaping Chinese ideas of citizenship and community’, delivered by Professor Rana Mitter of the Institute for Chinese Studies, University of Oxford. It will be chaired by Professor Mervyn Frost, and a reception will follow the lecture. Contact alumoff@kcl.ac.uk to express your interest in attending.

by Classics students in the original Ancient Greek, will be followed by tea and coffee in the theatre bar. Contact the Alumni Office.

Norfolk Choir Concert

Advent Carol Service

Friday 3 December 2010 Strand Chapel The candlelit Advent Carol service includes readings and a classical music performance by the Chapel choir, followed by a reception with mince pies and mulled wine. Due to demand, seating is by free ticket in advance only, available on a ‘first-come first-served’ basis. A maximum of two tickets per person. Contact the Alumni Office.

City Networking Breakfast

Thursday 3 March 2011 Venue tbc Alumni are invited to attend this networking event for City-based alumni. A guest speaker is followed by structured networking and a breakfast reception. Contact the Alumni Office.

Greek Play

Friday 11 February 2011 Greenwood Theatre, London Bridge Alumni are invited to attend the matinee performance of this year’s Greek Play, Helen by Euripides. The play, performed

Dental Alumni Weekend

4-5 March 2011 Guy’s Campus/Tower Hilton The line-up includes specialist meetings on Friday afternoon, the Dental Dinner

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The fondly remembered Halliday Hall on Clapham Common, sadly now long gone

a long-time member of staff at King’s and one of the first residents of Halliday Hall. Professor Earles gave a brief overview of life in Halliday in the early 1950s and outlined the subsequent life of the Hall as viewed from his position as chairman of the King’s halls of residence management committee. Philip Mitchell provided a display of memorabilia from the 1950s with some additional contributions by Mike Williams and Bob Woollett. The collection included group photographs

Saturday 26 March 2011 Wymondham Abbey Join former King’s Principal Professor Arthur Lucas CBE FKC in his home town of Wymondham for an atmospheric evensong performance by the King’s Chapel Choir. A reception will be hosted by alumna Dr Christine Buchan following the concert. Contact the Alumni Office to express your interest in attending. Alumni Weekend 2011

10-12 June 2011 Strand Campus/various London venues Alumni are invited to attend a range of lectures, tours and social events at this reunion weekend including lunch with the Principal in the Great Hall. For further information on events and getting your class together for a reunion, please contact the Alumni Office.

Guy’s Dental Reunion

Halliday Hall Reunion Lunch On Saturday, 12 June, King’s alumni who had lived in Halliday Hall in the 1950s and early 1960s gathered together for their first ever reunion. Timed to coincide with the 2010 Alumni Weekend, the much anticipated event was held in Chapters restaurant on the Strand campus as the Clapham Common hall of residence sadly no longer exists. The idea for the reunion was conceived at the 2008 Alumni Weekend after a chance meeting of two former residents. Tracking down the names and addresses of residents proved a major undertaking, as the College had no list in its records, but eventually enough were found and notices were placed in In Touch and on the King’s alumni website. After an encouraging response, Keith Newton (Civil Engineering, 1958) pressed ahead with the plans and about 35 former residents and a few wives sat down to lunch. Two joined later after the Principal’s lunch, and several more expressed their regret at being unable to attend. The reunion opened with a glass of wine, and was followed by a welcome address by Professor Stanley Earles,

on Friday evening and Clinical Day on Saturday. Online booking opens in mid-December. Brochures will be available in the next edition of InDent early in 2011. If your company would be interested in sponsoring the weekend, please contact the Alumni Office.

of residents for several years, copies of accommodation invoices, and notices to residents posted at the time. In addition, there were a few preliminary copies of a brief history of Halliday which is still under preparation. After lunch, renewal of acquaintanceships and discussion continued late into the afternoon. If good food, laughter and the sound of animated conversations are the mark of a successful reunion, this one more than met the criteria.

‘I am delighted to report that our recent five-yearly reunion celebrating 45 years since we first met as innocent freshers was its customary success,’ writes David Davidson (Guy’s, Dentistry, 1974). Despite some advance teasing about the perils of moving to Chepstow, the facilities at St Pierre could not have been bettered. A beautiful location combined with fabulous weekend-long weather meant that all who attended enjoyed a most memorable occasion. ‘As in previous years the reunion was attended by the vast majority of the 1965 intake, including plenty of our overseas visitors from USA, Canada, New Zealand and Australia. A golf competition on the Saturday morning proved popular, as did the rooftop bar for informal drinks prior to the dinner. The lively conversations reassuringly confirmed that replacing dentistry with alternative interests as retirement beckoned was not proving difficult, international travel and alternative studies being the most popular’. The next reunion celebrating the ‘half century’ will be in late Spring 2015.

Want to get involved? Contact alumoff@kcl.ac.uk or call +44 (0)20 7848 3053

Full of Turkish delight 6 ways you can get involved with your alumni community • Volunteer to be a Lion for the next Lion’s Den, see page 45 • Join King’s Connections careers networking service • Join a group or committee • Organise your own reunion • Become a marketing volunteer in your area • KCL Radio needs you! We are looking for alumni working in journalism, broadcasting and the charitable sector who can lend their time or skills to give KCL Radio the best possible start. If you think you could give a short lecture, run a masterclass or simply exchange tips via email, please contact the Alumni Office on alumoff@kcl.ac.uk www.alumni.kcl.ac.uk/getinvolved The King’s Travellers take time out on their journey through history in the Aegean

This year’s sell-out King’s Travel Programme saw 27 King’s alumni and friends visit Turkey and the classical cities of the Aegean coast on a 12-night trip described by Christopher Kevill-Davies (King’s, Theology, 1969) and his wife Sally as ‘one of the most memorable holidays we’ve ever had’. Accompanied by Dr Dionysius

Stathakopoulous, Lecturer in Byzantine and Modern Greek Studies, our intrepid explorers visited numerous well-known sights such as the breathtaking Hagia Sophia in Istanbul, the ancient city of Troy, and excavation sites at Ephesus, where they enjoyed an exclusive behind-the-scenes tour – a highlight of the trip for many.

Of course, a holiday wouldn’t be complete without sunbathing and the time between visits was spent relaxing in the sun and getting to know one another on two traditional gullet boats. The group was full of praise for Dr Stathakopoulous. ‘He was stimulating and fun,’ said Brian and Therese Anderton (King’s, Biochemistry and

Neuroscience, 1972/Biophysics and Neuroscience, 1978). ‘He had much to contribute, was an enthusiastic tutor, and an engaging raconteur amongst the interesting company at the dining table.’ If you would like to join the King’s Travel Programme, email alumoff@kcl.ac.uk or call +44 (0)20 7848 3053 and be among the first to hear about our 2011 trip.

The Incredible Adventures of Reggie Once again, our inbox has been swelled with stories of King’s much-loved (and long-suffering) mascot. But we’re always eager for more, so please email us your tale at alumoff@kcl.ac.uk or visit www.alumni.kcl.ac.uk/reggiestory

fight took place and poor old Reggie finished up in the Thames, but must have been able to swim and was fortunately fished out. Happy days!’

The VE Day kidnapping

We’ve received no less than three accounts of the great heist of 1945, when Reggie was taken hostage by a crack Guy’s snatch squad as London celebrated VE Day. ‘We were all members of the boxing team,’ recalls Michael Mason (Guy’s, Medicine, 1950). ‘Somehow we got into the back of Somerset House then into King’s. Having secured Reggie we “borrowed” a Post Office van and drove him back to Guy’s.’ ‘King’s College students were up in arms,’ chips in Dr Frank Clifford Rose (King’s, Medicine, 1944) ‘and gathered the next day to raid Guy’s armed with flour and water; the mortuary was left in ruins.’ But, says Michael, ‘they never found Reggie and were driven out empty-handed.’ John Burt (Guy’s, Dentistry, 1945) continues: ‘When the Dean got to hear

He ain’t heavy, he’s our Reggie

VE Day celebrations but where’s Reggie?

of this, instructions were given to take Reggie back to the rightful owners. A parade was formed with Reggie emerging from the Works Department having been painted in Guy’s colours. That afternoon we paraded over London Bridge with Reggie high on the shoulders and escorted by the City police force. When the waiting students saw their Reggie being carried past they burst out to recover him. An almighty

‘When I was a student, the story was that some years earlier poor Reggie had been flattened by some dastardly students from University College who drove a steamroller over him. Upon his recovery and being restored to his former glory, he was filled with concrete to prevent such an indignity happening again. I can well Ge remember it took at involvte least four (if not six or Tell us d! eight) “engineers” to favouryour carry Reggie around.’ Reggie ite tale Eric Misselke (Engineering, 1958)

autumn 2010 IN TOUCH

Alumni groups To find out what is happening in each region, please contact the alumni below UK alumni subject groups AKC Alumni Group Peter King kingpd@hotmail.com Bar Society Ms Bahar Ala-Eddini (Law, 2007) alumni@kclbarsociety.co.uk www.kclbarsociety.co.uk King’s College Construction Law Association (KCCLA) Mr Joe Bellhouse (Construction Law, 1996) jbellhouse@wedlakebell.com www.kccla.org.uk Dental Alumni Association Warren Birnbaum (KCSMD, Dentistry, 1971) warren.birnbaum@kcl.ac.uk King’s College London Engineering Association (KCLEA) Mr Graham Raven (Civil Engineering, 1963) g.raven@sky.com Currently expanding alumni activities, please see website for further details Geography: The Joint School Society Mrs Jo Crocker (Geography, 1956) alumoff@kcl.ac.uk Law Alumni Group Mr Robin Healey (Law, 1968) robin.healey@blueyonder.co.uk Theology & Religious Studies The Revd Giles Legood (Theology & Religious Studies, 1988) giles.legood@hotmail.co.uk

Other UK groups Student and Alumni Boat Club Current Student & Social Secretary Rachel Fellows enquiries@theboatclub.org.uk Former Staff Dr Barrie Morgan (Former member of the Geography Department) alumoff@kcl.ac.uk King’s Alumni Theatre Society (KATS) Mr Konstantinos (Kos) Mantzakos (German & Modern Greek, 2001) kosmantzakos@hotmail.com www.kats.swiit.net Queen Elizabeth College Association Mr John Brockhouse (QEC, Food Science, 1978) john.brockhouse@btinternet.com www.qeca.org.uk Southampton & Hampshire regional group Mr Tope Omitola (Mathematics, 1994) tope.omitola@soton.ac.uk

International groups 01. Bangladesh Malik Bari (Business Management, 2005) malik.bari@gmail.com 02. Belgium Fabian Kaisen (Economics for Competition Law, 2009) fabian.kaisen@freshfields.com 03. Canada Charles R. Maier (History, 1971) (President) charles@ maier.ca 04. China Scott Willis (War Studies, 1996) scottzbj@gmail.com Jeremy Xiao (Law, 1990) jeremy.xiao@credit-suisse.com 05. Denmark Christina Type Jardorf christina.type.jardorf@accura.dk 06.Egypt Professor Ibrahim El-Hakim (Dentistry, 1990) imelhakim@hotmail.com 07. Grand Cayman Christina Rowlandson (Biomedical Science, 1999) christina.rowlandson@gov.ky 08. France Charlotte Butruille (Law, 1995) butruille-cardew@hohl-avocats.com Jean-Luc Larribau (English and French Law, 2004) jean-luc.larribau@freshfields.com 09. Ghana David Larbie (European Community Law, 2000) davidlarbie@yahoo.co.uk

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Germany 10. Bonn Juergen Waldhaus (Theology & Religious Education, 1987) juergen.waldhaus@zivit.de 11. Munich Henry Selby-Lowndes henry.selby-lowndes@kclalumni.net 12. Berlin Marc Jarzebowski (Theology, 1995) jarzebowski@taxodium.eu 13. Greece Paris Vallides (1987) (President) kclagr@gmail.com 14. Hong Kong Chin Yu Liu (Engineering, 1983) (Chairman) cy93273272@yahoo.com.hk 15. Indonesia Gerald Ariff (Electronic Engineering, 1997) gwariff@gmail.com India 16. Delhi Sonal Singh (Law, 2007) sonal.kr.singh@gmail.com 17. Mumbai Vineet Dujodwala (Chemistry & Management, 1996) resins@dpcl.net 18. Iran Abdolreza Norouzy (Academic Pedagogic Practice, 2005) Norouzy@gmail.com 19. Italy Maria Chiara Russo (Environmental Sciences, 1979) kingscollege.milan@gmail.com 20. Japan Eiichi Kawata (Law, 1981) ekawata@typhoon.co.jp 21. Kenya David M. Ndetei (Friend of IOP) dmndetei@uonbi.ac.ke 22. Kuwait Michael Dalton (Civil Engineering, 1975) mdalton10@gmail.com 23. Lebanon and Syria Raif N Shwayri (Mechanical Engineering, 1991) raif@al-kafaat.org 24. Malaysia Philip Koh Tong Ngee (Law, 1980) kclamb.2007@gmail.com 25. Netherlands Huib Berendschot (European Community Competition Law, 2000) hberendschot@akd.nl 26. Nigeria SO Ajose (Electronics, 1974) mide.ajose@lasunigeria.org 27. Pakistan Mr Arshad Tayebaly (Law, 1990) changi@cyber.net.pk 28. Portugal Ana Sofia Batista (Law, 2002) anasofia.batista@abreuadvogados.com 29. Qatar Raghavan Gopakumar (Construction Law & Arbitration, 2007) rngopakumar@rasgas.com.qa 30. Saudi Arabia Haytham Tayeb (Orthodontics, 2006) drhtayeb@gmail.com 31. Singapore Stephen Lee (Aquatic Resource Management, 1972) unimkt@singnet.comsg 32. Spain Bruno Gonzalez-Vellon (Electronic Engineering, 2003) brunogonzalezvellon@hotmail.com 33. Switzerland Patrick Bade (European History, Politics & Society, 2007) info@patrickbade.com USA 34. Boston Andy Jones (Chemistry, 1987) andy.jones2138@gmail.com 35. Chicago Mark Atkinson (Theology, 1989) m.atkinson1@gmail.com 36. New York Renee Hoehn (International Peace and Security, 2003) renee_hoehn@yahoo.com and Neal Profitt (English, 2001) snprofitt@kclalumni.net 37. Pacific Northwest Shabbir Bashar shabbir_bashar@yahoo.com 38. Southern California Deborah Garvin dkgarvin@cox.net 39. Washington DC Angela Crowdy acrowdy@oas.org 40. Southern Tri-state Liz Manugian emanugian@mac.com 41. Philadelphia Lauren Remick Martone lrm196@gmail.com 42. San Francisco Peter Otridge (Mechanical Engineering, 1988) peter@otridge.com

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Canada Charles R. Maier I look back on my days at King’s as key to my professional and personal development. Studying in London created many great memories: I could take in unforgettable concerts, operas and stage productions, and events like the State Opening of Parliament and Royal Gala film premieres. I also had the privilege of working with some of the outstanding historians of the time, and with primary documents in London’s incomparable archival holdings. I became involved in our alumni association because I value what King’s did for me. Today King’s is clearly one of the world’s pre-eminent higher education institutions. Those of us living in Canada whose careers have benefited from King’s have a role to play in enhancing that reputation. By our contributions we can support Canadian students seeking to study at the College, strengthening the rich cultural and academic links between King’s and Canada. Number of alumni in Canada: 951. Next event: Friends of King’s College London in Canada AGM, November 2010

More details on the alumni groups can be found on our website or by calling the Alumni Office I had a great time at King’s and enjoyed myself thoroughly. I made some amazing friends from different parts of the world that I’ll have forever. My professors were very helpful and friendly and I still miss the trips to the pub with them where we had some interesting discussions. I remember on the day of orientation, all the LLM students were asked to sit in a hall and volunteer for the election

New Delhi Sonal Singh

for the student association. I gave a speech and got a great response, and when the results were announced, I thought my name was called. I stood up and started walking towards the stage before I realised that I had misheard the name and a girl had won! She became a good friend of mine. I got involved with the alumni branch to keep in touch with King’s, and also to give something back to the College,

where I spent some great moments of my life. We have formed a small alumni group in Delhi; we’re now on Facebook and we try to organize events at least once a year. We would appreciate your support: let’s relive the good times! Number of alumni in India: 517. Number of alumni in New Delhi: 120. Most recent event: Alumni reception, September 2010

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Switzerland Patrick Bade Switzerland is a country where people, cultures and languages come together – a lot like King’s itself. I was therefore surprised in 2009 when I discovered that the little state did not have its own KCL alumni branch yet. Today we have reached nearly all recorded alumni in the region and are hearing from those who have moved here recently. It is great to provide a forum where alumni can keep

up with each other, with King’s and also with UK-Swiss affairs. My professors at King’s were absolutely fantastic and the College really helped me to develop independent critical thinking. There was a genuine camaraderie with fellow students which is great to remember. And great moments continue to happen as I meet fellow alumni both in business and while travelling to

different parts of Europe and the world. King’s also continues to provide me with food for thought through its wide range of lectures and events throughout the year – both in London and around the world. Number of Swiss alumni: 327. Most recent event: Branch launch at the British Consulate in Geneva, October 2010

autumn 2010 IN TOUCH

Alumni groups The KCLA Chairman

Lord Ian McColl FKC

This issue of In Touch is focused on the College Campaign, our most ambitious ever, designed to maintain King’s impressive progress, despite financial pressures at home and increasing international competition. KCLA has traditionally stood aside from direct fundraising activity and left these matters to the professional fundraising team. However, we now judge the need to be so crucial to the future sucess of King’s that KCLA Council, after much debate, has decided to abandon its historical stance and form the Alumni Giving Committee, as a Council subcommittee, to work with the College to maximise the alumni contribution. Our target, shared with the College, is to at least double the number of alumni donors over the projected five years of the campaign. At present, as I reported in the spring, about one in 40 of our alumni contribute financially to King’s. This new AGC will be chaired by Professor Stephen Challacombe FKC (Guy’s, Dentistry, 1968). We are delighted to welcome Lord Ian McColl FKC (Guy’s, Medicine, 1957) as Vice-President. He will become President in November, succeeding the indefatigable Dame Jinty Nelson. Ian, an active member of the House of Lords, is a most distinguished surgeon at Guy’s, where he still lectures. He is also the driving force behind the Mercy Ships charity.

This month Professor the Lord Ian McColl of Dulwich CBE FKC (Guy’s, Medicine, 1957) will assume the Presidency of the KCLA from Dame Jinty Nelson FKC who is stepping down after two years at the helm. ‘It is a great honour and I am delighted to be able to help’, says Lord McColl. ‘We have so many alumni across the world and I hope that many more can be galvanised to take an active interest in the College and to assist in any way they can. There are many ways in which alumni can contribute to the College. Providing for its students is important as they have so much more expense today, but alumni can also get involved in the life of the College by enjoying the many lectures and events that take place within it. It’s a great institution that produces marvellous people.’

The Dean spoke on the AKC’s past, present and future at the new alumni group’s launch

In focus: AKC Alumni Group The launch of the AKC Alumni Group was celebrated at King’s on 19 May. The Dean, Reverend Professor Richard Burridge, gave the inaugural lecture on the history of the AKC and its future development. He stressed the special qualities of the course and qualification, particularly its wider theological vision and engagement with secular issues and practical concerns. It was his hope that the AKC Group would become a forum for contact between current AKC students and alumni, and promote the active involvement of alumni with the AKC course and its aims by facilitating discussion and debate on relevant topics and issues. AKC lectures going back three years are accessible to alumni on the King’s website. Professor Keith Hoggart, the VicePrincipal, welcomed the 78 alumni and students at the event and expressed the

hope that the AKC group would play a significant role in the development of closer links between the College and its alumni. A reception followed in the River Room, most generously sponsored by the KCLA. Lord Harries, the former Bishop of Oxford, is the President of the AKC Alumni Group and he will give its second lecture on 4 November. The Group is establishing its own distinctive website and putting in place a programme of events and activities. AKC alumni are encouraged to become Founder Members of the Group. An application form can be downloaded from the website. The AKC is unique to King’s; please give this Alumni Group your active participation and support. Judge Peter King TD, Chairman, AKC Alumni Group

KATS call

King’s College London Association KCLA is the alumni association for all former students, staff and friends of King’s and the Colleges with which it has merged. All alumni are welcome to participate in the KCLA’s work by attending meetings and voting in its elections. KCLA will hold its next Annual General Meeting and elections on Friday 5 November 2010. The following elected members will continue to serve on the Council: Patron Archbishop Desmond Tutu FKC (Theology, 1965)

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Past President Sir Ian Gainsford (KCSMD, Dentistry, 1950) President Dame Jinty Nelson (Former staff, Emeritus Professor of Medieval History) Vice-President Professor The Lord McColl of Dulwich CBE FKC (Guy’s, Medicine, 1957) Past Chairman Steven Rhodes (Theology & Religious Studies, 1988) Chairman Andrew Parrish (Chemistry, 1966) Secretary Valerie Beynon (Geography, 1961)

Lord Ian McColl takes the helm

Elected members

Andrew Papanikitas (Medicine, 2002) Robin Healey (Law, 1968) Peter Ellender (Law, 2007) Jason Jun (Business Management, 2005) Patricia Reynolds (Dentistry, 1977) The following positions are open for election this academic year: • Treasurer • Three elected members

Designed for busy King’s graduates, the King’s Alumni Theatre Society (KATS) brings together alumni who enjoy acting, literature and productions. This year we proudly presented Roger Vitrac’s Victor or Power to the Children, translated from the French by our very own Jim Chadburn (Law, 2003), at the Calder Bookshop Theatre in Waterloo. If you have a mini-drama (20 minutes) that you’d like to see staged, or comedy sketches for the 2011 KATS Review, please email kosmantzakos@ hotmail.com. We are also seeking new members: see www. kats.swiit.net.

For the latest information about all of our alumni groups go to www.alumni.kcl.ac.uk

Above and beyond

Alumni benefits and services

King’s College London Alumni Mountaineering Club (KCLAMC) is a relatively fledgling group set up a couple of years ago for alumni who were involved in the KCL Mountaineering Club (KCLMC) – a large and active sports club with a long history at the College. We aim to provide alumni with opportunities to keep up their climbing, and with each

A rich crop of benefits and services If you studied at King’s, or at one of the Colleges we have merged with, you are automatically a member of the King’s College London Association (KCLA). Please visit www.alumni.kcl.ac.uk or call +44 (0)20 7848 3053 for more details.

other, by arranging climbing and social events. Last year a group of KCLAMC members, led by Edward Lemon, Gareth Mottram and Martin Jones, ran an expedition to Kyrgyzstan, ascending previously unclimbed mountains. For more information, contact Tim Rogers, KCLMC Alumni Officer, at timcolinrogers@gmail.com

In Touch Magazine

Mailed twice a year to all alumni. If you or somebody you know would like to receive In Touch, please contact us. E newsletter

Special discounted rates are available if you would like to join KCLSU Kinetic gym in Stamford Street, Waterloo. For more details, call +44 (0)20 7633 2188 Stay at King’s

The stopover service can help you to find accommodation at one of our halls of residence during the summer vacation. King’s College Credit Card

Another free service to help you stay in touch with your College friends, allowing you to update your personal details and network professionally. Alumni email

Special offers

Join Alumni Online to register for your alumni email address.

The Alumni Office is pleased to present a range of more than 30 exclusive discounts and offers for our alumni. Here’s a taster of what we offer; see online for more.

King’s Connections

A careers advice directory which lists alumni willing to give their advice to other alumni and students. Use the library

The College’s Information Service Centre and libraries (except the Institute of Psychiatry library) are available to all alumni. Reading in the libraries is free, and you can borrow books and materials for £50 annually. Learn a language

The MLC Evening Programme offers a wide range of languages at all levels, including specialised courses. King’s alumni are eligible for a 30 per cent discount. Courses start in October, January and April. For more information or to register, email modern.language@kcl.ac.uk KCLAMC offers alumni the opportunity to keep up with their climbing

Short courses: King’s Professional and Executive Development

Lion’s Den needs new mentors

Alumni receive special discounted rates for all short courses, which now include International Business Negotiation and Ethical Leadership. For more details, visit www.kcl.

a mentor for two years, says: ‘It was a delight to work with my team. They worked incredibly hard and were very professional. I wish I’d had something similar when I was at King’s. It’s great to give back and support the teams.’ We are keen to identify alumni who can give talks about their business. In particular, we are seeking alumnus with legal, contracts and IP expertise, and another with a large pharma/ biotech background who could talk on ‘From bench to the patient bedside’. If you are interested in volunteering, please contact amy.1.webb@kcl.ac.uk

Get fit at King’s

Our only official credit card, the King’s College Credit Card has been carefully designed to provide great value, as well as supporting King’s. To apply, call 0800 028 2440, quoting ‘King’s College London Credit Card’

Alumni Online

Lion’s Den, King’s Flagship Entrepreneurial Training Programme and Business Plan Competition aimed at early career researchers and postgrads (both PhD and MA), is looking for King’s entrepreneurs/alumni who could offer input on a voluntary basis. Around a dozen King’s alumni now support this initiative, which provides participants with commercial awareness training and the opportunity to develop a business idea related to their research, or inspired by life outside King’s. Obi Abuchi (Manufacturing Systems Engineering with Management, 2002),

ac.uk/business/commercial/cpd/ or call Dr Cordula Janowski on +44 (0)20 7848 6814

Alton Towers

up to 40 per cent Call 0871 222 4001, quoting‘rewards’ Blackwell

Five per cent www.blackwell.co.uk/kingscollege Cottages 4 You

10 per cent Call 0845 268 1414, quoting ‘KCL10’ Lonely Planet

20 per cent www.lonelyplanet.com, code ‘KCL20’ Sealife Centres

up to 55 per cent Call 0871 222 4001, quoting ‘rewards’ Virgin Experiences

15 per cent Call 0845 330 5115, quoting ‘alumni’ or visit Alumni Online

Visit alumnwww. ac.uk if.kcl. more i or nfo

Short courses — alumni special offer Alumni discounts of 10 per cent are available on all King’s Professional & Executive Development courses. King’s Professional & Executive Development is a new department that works with companies and organisations to design and deliver

learning solutions including developing bespoke training programmes and short courses. Forthcoming courses include Creative Leadership – Managing in the 21st Century which runs for two days 18-19 November 2010.www.kcl.ac.uk/business/bus/edu/

autumn 2010 IN TOUCH

Duel Day Fighting talk Every year, King’s alumni around the world gather to celebrate one of the most dramatic events in the College’s history. Duel Day commemorates that historic morning in 1829, when the Duke of Wellington fought with pistols at dawn to defend his honour and uphold the founding of King’s. Today, the celebration is a symbol of King’s commitment to diversity, and an opportunity to celebrate all that the College has achieved since then. This year, as ever, saw a colourful global turnout. Here are just a few of the highlights. Top hats and tales

‘Thirty of us sat down for a grand dinner [right] followed by the full top-hatted re-enactment of the duel between 1st Duke of Wellington and the Earl of Winchilsea on Battersea Fields over Catholic emancipation and the founding of King’s College London,’ writes Steven Rhodes (Theology & Religious Studies, 1988). ‘Re-enactment is now the focus for the evening; this is not just another meal with speeches; re-enactment reminds everyone of the full drama that was the founding of King’s. Each year, too, audience participation grows with various tables cheering (and booing) their Winchilseas and Wellingtons with gusto.’ Pride of King’s

Twenty young alumni and guests cut a Duel Day-themed dash through central London for the

KCLA Young Lions Pub Prowl, taking in the Red Lion on Kingly Street, the Duke of Wellington in Soho, the Wellington on the Strand, and ending in Tutu’s. Vive la différence!

Alumni raise pistols and glasses around the world to remember that dramatic dawn meeting on Battersea Fields

Jean-Luc Larribau (English & French Law, 2004) organised a Paris gathering of more than 60 alumni in the fittingly British surroundings of the Bombardier pub. The enthusiastic throng took turns to re-enact the infamous exchange by donning King’s colours and posing for photos with pistols drawn. Greek fest

The Greek Alumni Branch threw Athens’ first ever Duel Day Party at Aegli Zappeiou. Attended by some 100 alumni and friends, the evening started with a welcome drink, followed by a delicious buffet. Branch President Paris Vallides addressed guests, briefing them on the history of the Duel and future plans for the Branch, and the party continued with live music. Most guests danced till late (or should that be early?), making it a night to remember. Duel Day down under

Blessed with one of the world’s great backdrops, looking

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out over the Sydney Opera House and the Harbour Bridge, some 20 alumni and friends celeberated Duel Day in the evening sunshine. There really couldn’t have been a better place in all Australia for the occasion. Alumni raised a few toasts to the College, kicking off what’s hoped to be the first of many such social events in New South Wales. Singapore relations

‘King’s College London Alumni Society Singapore members gathered on Sunday 28 March for a lovely brunch,’ writes Dr Stephen Lee (Aquatic Resource Management, 1972), President of KCLASS. ‘A number of young LLBs joined us for the “Duel Meal”, and the light-hearted conversation was free of legal jargon as the courts are not convened on Sunday.’ The next Duel Day is 24 March 2011. Whether it is arranging to meet College friends or simply donning red and blue and raising a glass to King’s, be sure to mark the day – and then tell us all about it. To find out more about the history of the Duel and celebrating Duel Day please visit www.alumni.kcl.ac.uk/duelday

Class notes While we make every effort to verify the information here, which is selected and edited for space, we cannot guarantee its accuracy. If you have concerns over any content, please contact the Alumni Office. And remember, you can also update your personal records at Alumni Online. Visit www.alumni.kcl.ac.uk

Chelsea College Maria Russo

Environmental Sciences, 1979 I’m now a theatre director writing contemporary novels. Bimla Kakar

Science, 1980 Senior Vice-President, King’s College London Alumni Delhi (KCLAD). Life member of India Pharmaceutical Association. Lee San Chung

Biochemistry, 1981 I would like to get in touch with Biochemistry class of 1981 at Chelsea. Susan Smith (now Kemp)

Chemistry, 1982 Changed career in 2006 and now teaching Chemistry to A-Level – should’ve done it years ago! Afshan Ahamd

Immunobiology, 1983 I’d like to get in touch with all those who did Immunology and Microbiology at Chelsea College, starting 1977.

The critic’s choice Alexi Duggins

Working as a TV critic at Time Out magazine, Alexi (King’s, Philosophy, 2003) has been able to live his dreams. ‘I’ve been a restaurant judge on a TV show. I’ve hung out in comedian Harry Hill’s green room. And, best of all, I irked music producer Pete Waterman into barking like an enraged walrus at a Eurovision press conference. ‘I end up being a guinea pig for a lot of off-the-wall features. Thus far the biggest challenge has been not blacking out when punched in the stomach by a homicidal cage fighter. Although having Jeremy Clarkson scream “Beardyman!” in my face and being unable to come up with a retort was a personal low.’ Working on ROAR, the student newspaper, gave him vital experience.

still enjoy 10-mile walks twice a week on Dartmoor and its coastal paths with my lovely partner. Peter Pickett

Dentistry, 1952 Retired for 22 years and a magistrate. My wife, Janet (Guy’s, 1952), died in August 2009.

Tina Blair (now Flatau)

Pharmacy, 1984 Living in Wimbledon but often in Chelsea with our teenagers in tow, marvelling at Manresa Road – now very much luxury flats. Currently with a super biotech company working in muscular dystrophy. Love to hear from old colleagues.

You can view lots of fabulous old class photographs at www. alumni.kcl.ac.uk Bryan Hayhow

‘The examples the various editors set showed me that you can achieve anything if you’re determined enough. And the belief they placed in me gave me the confidence not to be afraid of going against the grain.’ His funniest experience at King’s? ‘Giving an induction talk to an auditorium of freshers. “The Students’ Union is the most important thing at King’s!” I yelled. “Anyone thought about joining the student council?” Blank faces. So I launched into a 20-minute diatribe about representation. A hand goes up. “Sorry, we’re here for an open day. None of us are actually students…” As for non-work interests: ‘My time as a member of KCL Riding Club has left me with a life-long love of riding. Otherwise, I enjoy obsessively immersing myself in American TV.’

Norma Allen (now Williams)

Medicine, 1962 Living in a 24th-floor flat overlooking the ocean, painting flowers. Peter Gedge

Dentistry, 1963 Guy’s dental graduates from 1962/63 meet annually in May for golf.

Alan Young

Dentistry, 1957 Keeping in touch with patient-user group of hospital. Gamekeeper turned poacher!

Medicine, 1958 Still working in psychotherapy, three days a week from home.

Michael Mason

Thomas Kolb

Allen Medhurst

Medicine, 1950 Vice-President of Rowcroft Hospice. Live now with uninterrupted views of beautiful Torbay. Knocking on 83 but

Dentistry, 1959 Retired but still giving talks and lectures in the various aspects of the history of science and medicine.

Medicine, 1965 Planned to fully retire at the end of September 2010 after 40 years with the practice. What changes there have been!

Guy’s

Christopher Rowland

Medicine, 1971 Retired from clinical oncology in 2004. My MBE last year was quite a surprise. Christopher Bates

Medicine, 1976 Retired in April 2010 to sail around the world. Joined in the Azores by my wife Penny, a former Guy’s-trained nurse. Gill Dodd (now Evans)

Medicine, 1979 Currently job-sharing with GP husband. Plan to retire in 2011. John Spence

Medicine, 1986 My most recent book is The Actor’s Brain: Exploring the Cognitive Neuroscience of Free Will (OUP). Sanjeev Bhanderi

Dentistry, 1993 Opened a specialist endodontic office for South Manchester and Cheshire, and running a new postgraduate course in endodontology at University of Central Lancashire.

Institute of Psychiatry Neville Gittleson

David Browning

Medicine, 1964 With my sister Valerie, a midwife, I’ve launched a charity, The Barbara May Foundation, aiming to reduce maternal mortality and birth injury in Ethiopia (www.maternityafrica.org). My son, Dr Andrew Browning, is a surgeon in the country. A sister organisation hopefully will commence in the UK.

Michael Hopwood

Medicine, 1969 Escaped from General Practice last year. Lyn and I plan to spend more time in our chateau in France once she hangs up her wig and retires from the bar.

Retired from clinical psychiatry. Still asked to give the odd lecture.

KCHSS Nora Luke (now Croft)

Household & Social Sciences, 1936 Now 95 and going strong. I lead two USA French groups for conversation in Caterham and I’m on the executive committee of MIND in Croydon. My friend and contemporary Julia Gaussen (later Brydone) died last year and I’m in touch with her two daughters, Julia and Christina, who live in New York.

autumn 2010 IN TOUCH

Class notes Anthea Lowe (now Sartain)

Paul Main

William Peal

Household & Social Sciences, 1948 Went to the Principal’s Symphony Concert with a friend from my student days (Dorothy Spiller), thoroughly enjoyed it and wrote to Professor Rick Trainor to say so. I received a nice letter back from him.

Medicine, 1973 Appointed Deputy Director of Severn Primary Care School, and also Honorary Senior Clinical Lecturer at University of Bristol.

Chemistry, 1946 A quiet year as a result of my wife’s illness. I enjoy good memories of King’s Chemistry, latterly becoming an Anglican vicar. Am in active retirement.

Neil Margerison

Robert Knecht

KCSMD

Medicine, 1979 Both children are getting married this year; I am taking early retirement.

History, 1948 I’ve been awarded the Enid McLeod Literary Prize by the Franco-British Society for 2009 for my latest book, The French Renaissance Court (Yale University Press).

John Price

Medicine, 1952 My book Not What The Doctor Ordered was published in March 2010 with Austin Mitchell, MP.

Francesa Darvell

Medicine, 1989 I am currently studying for an MA in Medical Ethics & Law.

Ted Maden

Claire Harvey (now Gains)

Medicine, 1960 My wife Sybil and I did a guided sands walk across Morecambe Bay recently, a great experience. We recently moved to Windermere.

Medicine, 1998 I married Jennifer Gains’ brother, Paul. We now live in Yorkshire and have two children aged five and one. Working as a consultant paediatric radiologist.

Alex Robinson

King’s College London

Medicine, 1965 Retired from General Practice in 1995. John Davis, a contemporary GP in Ashford, sadly died this year. Richard Wolverson

Dentistry, 1969 Just retired after 21 years as consultant general surgeon. Two grandchildren and a third on the way. Tony Moss

Medicine, 1971 Would like to know: is there going to be a 40th reunion?

Tony Bennett

Music Retired from the Music Department at the University of Sheffield, but can still be contacted there. Anthony Titford

Civil Engineering, 1939 I have contacted two Civil Engineering graduates, Richard Reiss (1937) and Neville Cooper (1939) through In Touch. Is there anyone else out there?

Desmond Lockyer

Theology, 1949 Next year I celebrate 60 years as a minister. Ronald Bristow

Civil Engineering, 1951 Still active as a volunteer for Friends of the London Transport Museum. Peter Hargreaves

Geography, 1951 I never thought I would be writing to you from a nursing home. My wife and I were both born in 1919, myself on 14 October (my father’s birthday also), and we had a lovely and happy life together. The King’s Geography Department in the late 1940s was the days of Professor SW Woolbridge, Doctors Wood, Balchim and Alice Coleman, and the ‘Joint School of Geography’ between King’s and LSE. My sister Edith Hargreaves graduated in English & History at King’s around 1936. She has lived and taught in Australia since 1950 and

became a great Godmother in 2009. Edith has an affectionate regard for her days at King’s. Concerning the canteen, she used to say: ‘Come where the food is cheap, come where the food is grand, come where the many pay tanner-and-penny, come to the place in the Strand!’ Still in touch with colleagues more than 60 years on. Long live Reggie! Donald Howle

Mathematics & Physics, 1951 It was in the Science Faculty that I met Linda Howle (formerly Stride, Geography, 1948). Sadly, she died on 12 May this year. Gavin Fargus

Theology, 1954 Following retirement from full-time ministry and other diocesan appointments in the Scottish Episcopal Church, I was received into the Roman Catholic Church in 1994. Although considered too old for re-ordination, I was appointed Eucharistic Minister and Reader at our village church, and play as full a part as I can in its life and mission. I study local history and archaeology as well. Peter Grace

Physics, 1955 Trying to raise money for a memorial to Sir Robert Watson-Watt, pioneer of radar, in his home town of Brechin, Angus. Derek Yandell

Physics, 1955 Still here and enjoying life with Janet, after 51 years. I would be pleased to hear from anyone.

It’s a kind of magic James Prichard

Religious Studies alumnus James (King’s, 2001) is an award-winning close-up magician who has appeared on television and has entertained royalty and politicians. ‘I always loved magic, but the big turning point was when I joined a club for young magicians. It was like a real-life Hogwarts. I went there every week and got to learn from professionals and top amateurs.’ Although the step from Religious

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autumn 2010

Studies to magic may not be an obvious one, James believes his course gave him a good grounding. ‘In magic you often need to be able to see things from different perspectives and my course really encouraged that. It really broadened my mind and shared similarities with magic in the way it made us question the nature of reality.’ James cites Penn and Teller as the magicians whom he most admires: ‘There’s an enormous amount of thought and passion behind what they

James creating a sense of wonder

do, which makes moments of their shows pure artistry.’ Performing at weddings, parties and high profile events, James most enjoys the reactions of his audience. ‘Seeing their amazement or laughter is very rewarding.’ And the worst thing about the job? ‘Hecklers who are only concerned with catching you out and won’t enjoy magic for what it is. I’m not looking to fool people, just get them to suspend their disbelief.’ www.legerdemainmagic.co.uk.

And remember you can register at www.alumni.kcl.ac.uk to update your personal details Michael Knowles

Diana Yorke (now Honeybone)

Mechanical Engineering, 1957 Having retired in 1994 I continue to do consultancy work on energy and waste matters. I’ve recently been invited to become an associate of the John Rony Initiative, an environmental substainability group in Cheltenham. I’m very keen to help to meet the engineering challenges of climate change and fair use of world resources.

English, 1963 Now retired to Norfolk where I am a volunteer steward at the Cathedral and perform with Norwich Early Dancing Group. With my husband, I’ve just published an edition of the 18th century letters of the Spalding Gentlemen’s Society.

Alan Mowles

English, 1957 Retired after stroke. Dallas Richardson (now Green)

English, 1958 For some years now I have enjoyed meeting for lunch at least once a year with fellow English classmates Celia Rees-Jenkins, Ann Irving (now Bird), Karen Ioan-Jones (now Mathias) and Hilary Walker (now Silvester).

Jacqueline Cooke (now Gauntlett)

Physiotherapy, 1965 Retired in 2008, having spent 14 years working in Portsmouth in palliative care. Our Physiotherapy set that started in October 1962 at King’s College Hospital is still in contact. Our Principal Evelyn Stewart only died last year, aged 100. David Jennings

Theology, 1966 Retired as Bishop of Warrington in September 2009 and now living at Northleach in Gloucestershire.

John hits the right spot John Lawrence

July saw Chelsea College alumnus and former Deputy President of its Students’ Union, John Lawrence (Biochemistry, 1982) take to the Turkish skies to represent the UK at the European Paragliding Accuracy Competition. Coming fifth in the European Competition, the team took first place in the Turkish Open. ‘In Turkey the sport is taken very seriously,’ says John. ‘In Inonu [where the tournament was staged] there is a school for aerial sports and any student can apply to spend a week there, free of charge. In the UK we are fighting desperately for funding because it’s not an Olympic sport.’ John is currently looking forward to the UK National Championships and is determined to ‘show the younger guys that I can still do it!’.

Paragliding accuracy involves launching yourself from a mountainside and gliding to the target area kilometres away. The target is just two centimetres in diameter and John likens the sport to ‘aerial darts’. He started parachuting in the late 1970s and ran the Chelsea College Parachute Club in the early 1980s. He joined the Green Dragons parascending club in 1985 where today he is a senior paragliding instructor. ‘The feeling of being in the sky is glorious but you always have to have a degree of fear because that’s what keeps you safe.’ Paragliding is very much a family affair as John’s wife and two children are also experienced fliers. They are however sensitive to the fact that others might worry about the risks... ‘It is a fantastic sport,’ says John, ‘but we always say “Don’t tell Grandma!”.’

Jim Bradbury

History, 1958 To be published shortly: Robin Hood (Amberley Books). Elizabeth Wright (now Holgate)

Geography & Geology, 1959 It’s good keeping in touch. Peter and I have enjoyed our annual cycling holiday, this time in the Vendée, which is comfortably flat. Wayne Thomas

Law, 1959 Retired as a senior partner of a medium-sized practice in South Wales 10 years ago. Various presidencies in the Rhondda area and a trustee of the Civic Trust for Wales. Enjoying retirement and rugby remains a passion. Jill Brown

Physiotherapy, 1962 I compiled a report on our class of 1959-62 reunion. We hope to plan the next about 2012. Michael Hunter

Theology, 1963 As a Reverend Canon I was awarded an MBE for services to the Church of England and the community in Grimsby.

Mel Stein

Law, 1966 Author of 18 books, the latest being Football Babylon. Specialist sports lawyer and also Chairman of the Association of Football Agents. Andrew Ennus

Physics, 1967 Now retired after a career working in radiation protection for the Ministry of Defence, and living in Bath. Ray Symes

Physics, 1967 Since retiring early from ICI in 1998, I’ve been running my own business in property management. Malcolm Grundy

1968 New book (my seventh), Leadership and Oversight, to be published December 2010. Okpete Okeke (now Kanu)

History, 1968 Our class of 1965-68 is holding its second get-together in London. I’m now retired after years of teaching African History and History of Education at Kabwe Teacher’s College in Zambia; Alvan Ikoku College of

John zeroes in on the tiny paragliding accuracy target

autumn 2010 IN TOUCH

Class notes A KIng’s hat trick for Rachel In 2002, Rachel founded IntoUniversity, a charity that helps young people from disadvantaged backgrounds to get into university or to achieve another chosen aspiration. ‘I believe in a meritocratic society where people have access to higher education because they deserve it. ’ IntoUniversity begins with children aged seven and offers out-of-school academic study, aspirational coaching and mentoring from current university students. ‘We take primary school children on trips to the top institutions in London and tell them about the courses and the qualifications they will need. This academic year, six children will graduate from our FOCUS programme at King’s College London!’ www.intouniversity.org

Rachel Carr

English literature alumna Rachel didn’t stop at getting her BA at King’s in 1986; she went on to take her master’s and PhD at the College too. ‘I didn’t consider anywhere else. I liked the department staff, I had access to excellent research facilities, and I wanted to be in the heart of London.’ While volunteering in her local community, Rachel began to compare her own experience of education with that of the underprivileged youngsters that she met. ‘I had the amazing experience of going to a top institution, whereas many young people today, who are equally bright, can’t do that as a result of obstacles that are not of their making.’

Education and Abia State University, both Nigeria; and as a Fulbright Scholar-in-Residence at Fort Valley State University, Georgia, USA. Russell Davies

Mathematics & Physics, 1969 Head of Mathematics at Cardiff University since 2006. I spend the week in Cardiff but return to mid-Wales at weekends.

Jane Wallbank (Dowie) (now Reynolds)

Theology, 1974 Recently dropped down from my responsibilities at school, hoping to go part-time soon. Stephen is doing well in his business. Tony and I are looking forward to retirement. Family are well. Life is good. Michael Reakes

English, 1969 Now chair of Medieval Texts & Cultures at University of Salford.

Physics, 1975 I’m developing e-learning and 3D Virtual Reality Simulations for the oil company Saudi Aramco in Saudi Arabia. I would love to hear from those at KCL with me.

Richard Beard

Desmond Banister

1971 Currently working in two charities that I founded with my wife: Sheffield Institute Foundation for Motor Neurone Disease Research, and Book Link – sending schoolbooks to Ethiopia (so far, three million over seven years).

French & German, 1975 After 34 years as a schoolmaster (the final 11 as headmaster of a preparatory school in Harrow) I took up the post of parish priest at All Saints’, North Hillingdon in September 2009.

Sue Harris-Smith (now Powell)

German, 1972 About to move to France and achieve my lifelong ambition of owning horses. I’ve bought nine acres and built a house in the Dordogne.

Chemistry & Mathematics, 1975 Working in the UK for STFC Information Management with continued involvement in Greece – website www.trigonogroves.com.

Physiology, 1973 Recently appointed consultant histopathologist.

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Theology, 1976 Left school teaching for volunteer work, mainly in the role of reader in the Church of England.

Theology, 1975 After 20 years as an advertising executive, at 55 I wished to give back time and effort to those less fortunate.

Timothy Sullivan

French, 1980 I left King’s 28 years ago – it scarcely seems possible. I’ve spent 11 years in Asia, two in the Middle East and 18 months in Switzerland. Twenty-five years of marriage and three children. Hamish Laing

Physiology, 1980 Recently appointed as Director of Acute Care for the Health Board.

Christopher Egan

Biochemistry, 1977 Now working from home and splitting my time between Cornwall and Brazil. Andrea Mottram

Theology, 1977 Currently working for the Diocese of Worcester as Heritage Buildings & Community Development Officer.

Physiology, 1977 Since 2007 I have been privileged to be involved with the establishment of a new dental school in the South West. Our first cohort will graduate next year. Ann Grain

Bill Kerr Kate Foster (now Morgan)

Jennifer Hawes (now Heinink)

Jonathan Bennett Denise Dray (now Francis)

Gill Barlow (now Nurse)

Since 2008 I’ve worked at the local hospital, cleaning wards and feeding patients. Living happily with wife Linda, two terriers and an octogenarian father on the coast at Seaford, Sussex. Greetings to all former classmates.

Spanish & Portuguese, 1979 My company JAG Press & Publicity is doing well despite the recession – everyone needs good PR! Would love to hear from anyone on my course.

Richard Barratt

Law, 1981 Spent 25 years in the City as a solicitor. Two years ago formed my own law firm and recently moved out of London. Deborah Guneratne

Geology, 1982 I am now an international storyteller and trainer for community, corporate and educational sectors. Richard Fisher

History, 1982 Returned to parish ministry following seven years as a hospital chaplain in Preston. Live in Loughton, Essex, and enjoy classical music and art exhibitions. Susan Clarke

English, 1983 Director of an Arts and Theatre Company based in North Staffordshire,

Call +44 (0)20 7848 3053 for more information about our alumni services and benefits and now a grandmother. Happy to celebrate the ‘big 50’ with any alumni!

John Pinkstone

Gary Hunt

Geography, 1990 Recently completed a successful year as President of the Milwaukee World Trade Association.

Geography, 1983 After 25 years I was ‘restructured’ out of the Bank of England and am now occupied with property development and enjoying myself. Mark Sowerby

Theology & Religious Studies, 1985 In 2009 I was consecrated Bishop of Horsham in Chichester Cathedral, where the sermon was delivered by another King’s man, the Reverend David Clues (Theology & Religious Studies, 1987).

Biochemistry & Physiology, 1990 Had a small reunion on London’s South Bank in April organised by Owen Brolly (Biochemistry, 1990).

English & French Law, 1991 After working at Linklaters and then in fundraising for 10 years, I am currently a full-time mum to Lucas (2000), Beatrice (2002) and Elise (2005). David Avery

Physics, 1992 Married with two children (nine and 12). Working in IT for over 15 years. Adrian Dobbs

Biochemistry, 1988 Re-training to be a National Childbirth Trust antenatal teacher.

Chemistry, 1992 Now Senior Lecturer in Organic

Education, 1988 Married to Hayley with three sons. Head of Middle School at Haberdasher Askes School, Southeast London, and a local magistrate. Stephen Dick

Chemistry, 1989 Living in Holybourne with Victoria (née Knight) and our five children. I have an antiquarian bookshop specialising in rare collectable books in all fields. Please www.holybournebooks.com. Julia Birkett

Geography, 1990 Working in Thailand, supervising a language school for new missionaries learning Thai. Louise Heal

Mathematics, 1990 Still living in London, working in software development and freelancing as a travel writer and blogger. Would love to hear from any ex-Maths Society members.

Nursing Studies, 1994 Working as a lecturer in mental health at the University of Southampton. Also trying to complete my PhD in Nursing.

Education, 1993, and Environment & Development, 2004 Our new baby Juliet was born in September 2009.

Claire Benham (now Parkin)

Nursing Studies, 1995 Recently passed my PhD Bioengineering transfer – writing-up now under way!

Arpana Jaitly (now Puri) Marianne Deconinck

Clare Butler (now Spink)

Mark Lloyd-Williams

Julia Pelle

Martin Blain & Anna Pitts (now Blain) James Fenton

Simon Corbin

Philosophy, 1986 I have written a novel, Rude Boy, that is available at Amazon. It also has a website called www.rudeboybook.com.

Chemistry at Queen Mary, after the University of Exeter (where I’d been happy for years) closed its Chemistry Department. Married Gemma Wall in Bury St Edmunds in July.

Molecular Biology & Biophysics, 1993 I am a dyslexia tutor, married with two children living in London. Sacha Ackland

Philosophy, 1994 Barrister practising in London, mother to Poppy aged 18 months.

Judith Middleton (now Brocklehurst)

Nursing Studies, 1995 I am Specialist Nurse Advisor – Critical Care for the Royal Navy, and am currently on maternity leave with my second child. Living the dream in Worcestershire with my army officer husband Geoff. Stephen Rigby

Ravi Mohindra

Mathematics & Management, 1994 I head up Vodafone’s Global Brand Legal Team based at their HQ in Newbury. Married to Pippa with two children (six and 10).

Classics, 1995 Married Rachel Knowles (English Literature, 1995). We have three daughters – Pippa (six), Lily (three) and Penny (nine months). Rashpal Bancil

By royal appointment Sir Richard Thompson

House calls don’t come any more high profile than those made by Sir Richard Thompson (St Thomas’, Medicine, 1964) who, for some years, tended to the medical needs of the Royal Household. ‘Luckily for me, St Thomas’ is very close to Buckingham Palace,’ he says. ‘I enjoyed it, though it was challenging, worrisome at times, to look after people in the public eye.’ He was delighted when, in 2003, the Queen awarded him a knighthood. After spending his clinical years as a student at St Thomas’, Sir Richard returned in 1972 as a GP, with an interest in gastroenterology, practising there until his retirement in 2005. ‘When I came back as a consultant, I taught medical students. I always enjoyed it; I think you learn a lot. Some of the questions that the students asked were very penetrating; what I would tend to do, cunningly, is say “Why don’t you look that up and tell me next week?”. It was good for them to look it up and I would look it up too.’ Sir Richard is now President of the Royal College of Physicians and looks

Pharmacy, 1996 King’s blessed me with a great education and a fighting chance at success. Richard Brownnutt

Mathematics, 1996 I’ve been working at IBM for 12 years but mixing this with family life, being a church leader and fostering young children in the local area. Claire Cummins

Geography, 1996 Currently working full-time in Guinea, West Africa, for an iron ore mining company where I am developing an occupational and community health management programme. Rebecca Pritchard (now Horrobin) ‘Always keep an open mind,’ says Sir Richard

back over his medical career with immense pride and fondness: ‘It is a wonderful profession. It is highly thought of in society and morally you really know that you’re doing something worthwhile.’

Human Biology, 1996 I gave birth to Oscar James in May – a younger brother to Thomas William. Andrew Parkin

Physiology, 1997 Recently became a GP Principal. Living in Kent with my wife and two young sons.

autumn 2010 IN TOUCH

Class notes Ian Hunt

Lola Atkins (now Omojola)

Deborah Hammond

Panagiotis Dimitrakis

Sports Law, 1998 Living in Christchurch, New Zealand, with my wife Penny and three children. Currently President of the Australian & New Zealand Sports Law Association.

Microbiology, 2002 Running an award-winning business, and branching out internationally.

Music, 2004 I am currently working as a product manager at a music media agency, working with major record labels on their releases. I’m still in touch with some of the music crowd.

War Studies, 2006 Published two books: Greece and the English and Military Intelligence in Cyprus (Tauris Academic Studies).

Robert Taylor

European Studies, 1998 Married to Debbie (formerly Reed, Human Biology, 1998) and expecting our first child in September. Oluseto Fasan

Law, 1999 After obtaining my LLM from King’s, I was called to the Bar in 2001. I later received a PhD in Law, worked briefly in Geneva and taught at both the LSE and Birkbeck College before joining the UK Government in 2007 as a senior policy adviser on regulatory reform. Stephen Wollaston

PGCE Religious Studies, 1999 As well as teaching, I’ve started designing the Green Spirit Journal and joined their publishing and editorial team. I have my fifth book released in February 2011, Spirituality Unveiled, Awakening to Creative Life, on eco-spirituality. Additionally, 1970s punk band The Wasps, of which I was a member, has a vinyl release of songs in December 2010. Victoria Clifford (now Collett)

Religious Education, 2000 Teaching Religious Studies in Malvern. Baby George was born in December 2009, and I have a delightful threeyear-old daughter Alice. I’ve had the privilege of becoming involved in a charity that supports schools in Gambia and would love to hear from anyone on the PGCE with me. Ruth Taylor (now Delap)

French, 2000 Got hitched April 2010 in Chester to Graeme. Currently relaxing in our refurbished home – spent every weekend for the last year getting to grips with DIY. Still teaching and smiling.

Gregory Austin

War Studies, 2002 Worked for various banks in London and Hong Kong, and about to start teacher-training course. Louise Deutsch (now Wright)

Nursing Studies, 2002 Married with two children and living in Cumbria. Kathryn Stanley (now Graham)

Biblical Studies, 2002 Began monthly Hartley Poetry Society last July, and membership has grown from seven to 27. Have discovered a rich seam of local poets willing to read their own work. Matthew Kyeremeh

Education Management, 2002 I’ve been elected for the second time as council member for the London Borough of Croydon. Nisha Desai (now Patel)

Computer Science, 2003 Working for a Danish software company. Married for four years and mother to a young boy. Mohd Yaacob

Child & Adolescent Psychiatry, 2003 Head of the Department of Psychiatry, Schools of Medical Sciences, Universiti Sains Malaysia. Chenine Bruley

Human Biology, 2003 After living in Australia for a year I am now back in London and training at the British School of Osteopathy. Kathryn Fanlund

2004 I am a program associate with the Vera Institute of Justice in Washington DC.

Angela Gash (now Keag)

Chemistry, 2001 I’ve recently given birth to our first son. Kieran Daniel Keag was born on 29 May 2010.

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autumn 2010

Marion Wheatley (now Rushbrook)

Child Studies, 2004 Retired from local authority and now working independently.

Ivan Sidique-Sillah

Development Geography, 2004 Since graduation I am constantly reminded of how much I owe the Geography Department. I am very proud to associate myself with it. Nina Jenkins (now Carayol)

Nursing Studies, 2005 Opened my restaurant Casa di Cumida in July in the Gambia.

Bryony Campion

Nutrition, 2007 Now a qualified dietician working in the South East of England. Andrew Young

War Studies, 2007 Having left the Royal Military Academy at Sandhurst, I am now a naval lieutenant at HMS Sultan, and a defence and political studies instructor. I am engaged to my fiancee, Sal. Faisal Alfadhel

Shotunde Olaleye

Nursing Studies, 2005 Working in the community sector is so rewarding, and it helps my psychological research of mental illnesses that affect people. Peter Davy

Science Education, 2005 Would like to hear from students on the MA in Science Education (2003-6). Robert Fellow

War Studies, 2006 I recently returned from Afghanistan where I commanded a rifle platoon. We were operating in Northern Sangin. Alison Whitelegg

Medical Immunology, 2006 Had a baby girl, Anna, last September and returned to work as a clinical scientist in July. Roan Kearsey-Lawson

2006 Since completing my third degree at King’s I’ve gone into the music business. This year I am running a jazz festival. Visit www.maritimejazzfestival. co.uk to see what I get up to.

Engineering & Business Studies, 2008 After graduating I joined the University of Bath. Currently doing my PhD in the Centre of Orthopaedic Biomechanics, Department of Mechanical Engineering – in the development of force sensors for surgical robotic systems. One more year to go to get ‘Dr’ title in Engineering. Paula Robinson

Academic Practice, 2008 Setting up a service facilitating a return to higher education and employment for mental health service users. Felix Meston

Music, 2009 Recently started working in marketing at Global Radio, looking after Classic FM and LBC. Very different to the academic arena. Francesca Moul

Law, 2009 I start my Legal Practice Course this September but before that I’m spending two weeks in Europe.

Nightingale Institute

Kathryn Kent

Maria Garner (now Garner-Jeffrey)

Pharmacology, 2006 Camp Mohawk is a day centre for children with special needs, particularly autism. As part of a small team of staff I have a wide range of responsibilities.

Nursing Studies, 1994 I am now the Director of Development for the World Forestry Centre whose mission is to educate the public about global forestry and sustainability.

Email us at alumnioff@kcl.ac.uk for advice on planning reunions and looking up old friends

Undercover in India Seema Sharma

Dental alumna Seema (Guy’s, 1989) established her first practice aged just 24. She now owns a small group of practices, is a partner in a UK practice for underprivileged communities, is Operations Director for a medical teaching course, operates her own dental management consultancy, and also her own charity, The Sharma Foundation. That’s quite a CV. Last year, Seema swapped her comfortable lifestyle to visit India for the UK’s philanthropic television show The Secret Millionaire. During her stay in the Mumbai slums she

volunteered with local charities, her co-workers having no idea of her real identity or the fact that she was there to share her wealth with them to the tune of tens of thousands of pounds. ‘I’ve had more opportunities than many,’ says Seema. ‘I want to empower people to learn to stand on their own two feet. This feels so achievable in India: you can change the lives of a whole family with very little.’ Seema was shocked to witness the appalling conditions in the slums and on the dumping grounds on which even children work sorting plastic waste for meagre pay. ‘There are 1.2 million living in the slum I stayed in, and many

more slums like it. It’s like having 200 people living in the average UK back garden. Even if you ploughed £1.2 million into just that slum, it would only feed that community for just a day and then life would go back to normal. Aid without sustainable change doesn’t last.’ How has the experience changed her? ‘I haven’t denounced materialism but it has been put into context. I am not critical of it, as I have met some very wealthy people who do an enormous amount of good. If you have the capacity to create wealth, you don’t have to create it only for yourself.’ www.seemasharma.co.uk.

struck by another causing rapid descent. Both my legs were broken and I suffered fractured vertebrae with spinal damage. Difficulty walking now. Michael Hardy

Medicine, 1965 Playing a lot of not-very-good golf. Four grand-daughters – three in Sydney and one in London – and trying to learn French. Michael Joy OBE

Medicine, 1966 High Sheriff of Surrey, in nomination for 2011. John Norman

Medicine, 1967 Now fully retired. We have a holiday home in the Dordogne that we let out. I am a parish councillor and involved in set-building for the local theatre group. Christopher Woollam

Medicine, 1969 Having been a consultant vascular surgeon in Sussex for nearly 25 years I have now retired from NHS practice, allowing more time for travel and golf. Phillip Ambler

Queen Elizabeth College Val Latham (now Hibbitt)

Biology & Physiology, 1970 Retired from teaching but still do some exam cover, supply and coaching. Given talks on science and local history. Huw Hughes

Nursing Studies, 1972 Involved with many charities, especially cancer research fundraising. I now have four grandchildren. Davia Hyams

Food Science & Chemistry, 1978 Now financially secure, I have

temporarily given up full-time work while I consider what to do next.

Alex Riddell married earlier this month to Rebecca Towler.

Siti Zulkifli

John Balint

Physiology & Biochemistry, 1982 I received a doctorate degree in Maternal Child Health in 1991 while working for the University of Malaysia’s Faculty of Medicine. I left in 2001 to focus on public health consultancy in sexual and reproductive health.

Medicine, 1949 In May 2009 I was given an honorary degree of Doctor of Science by Albany Medical College.

St Thomas’ Michael Riddell

Medicine, 1941 Achieved ‘Mandela Moment’ – four score and ten! Early senile dementia but fortunately physically fit. Grandson

Christopher Maycock

Medicine, 1961 Published A Passionate Poet: Susanna Blamire 1947-94 (Hypatia 2003), and Selected Poems of Susanna Blamire: Cumberland’s Lyrical Poet (Bookcase 2008). Harry Dawson

Medicine, 1965 In May 2009 my hot-air balloon was

Medicine, 1975 Retired in August after 28 years as a GP in Wantage. God willing I will continue to work with refugees from Burma on the Thai border, while pursuing a new life as a boat builder in the UK. Peter Fabricius

Medicine, 1976 Now Dean of Postgraduate Military Medicine, appointed February 2009. Doon Lovett (now Dodds)

Medicine, 1984 Back in medicine after seven years working as a textile conservator, and currently a salaried GP in Reading. This October I’m walking the Great Wall of China in aid of bowel cancer. Please visit www.justgiving. com/doonlovett.

autumn 2010 IN TOUCH

Obituaries On these pages we remember former students, staff and friends of King’s and its associated colleges and institutions. In Touch makes every effort to accommodate fitting tributes, and friends, family and former colleagues are welcome to submit obituaries to alumoff@kcl.ac.uk. However, constraints occasionally mean we may have to edit the entries . Robin Keeley

King’s, Botany, 1970. Robin was a pioneering forensic scientist, regarded as ‘the founding father of firearms chemistry’. After King’s, where he learned that he had developed Hodgkin’s disease for which he was successfully treated (a rare survivor then), he joined the forensic team at the Metropolitan Police in 1971. He quickly became an expert in chemical analysis and the use of an electron scanning microscope, and in 1978 helped solve the case of Bulgarian dissident Georgi Markov – killed by an umbrella tip poisoned, Robin discovered, with the ricin favoured by east European secret agents. In 1984, his analysis confirmed that WPC Fletcher had been shot dead by two gunmen firing from inside the Libyan embassy, rather than from an adjacent building as some claimed at the time. And it was his identification of a single particle of ‘firearms discharge residue’, which he concluded could have been linked to the killing of Jill Dando, that led to the conviction of Barry George – a case that subsequently troubled him. George had his conviction quashed in 2008. Robin was also a scientific adviser to the inquiries that led to the release of the Guildford Four and the Maguire Seven, and also to the novelist PD James, helping her to weave plausible plots and to utilise correct forensic techniques. The Very Revd Michael Sellors

King’s, Theology, 1960. Father Michael, as he liked to be known, was ordained a priest of the Church of England at St Paul’s Cathedral in 1962 and served a variety of parishes in England before being appointed Dean of the Cathedral of St George the Martyr in Jerusalem for a five-year term in 1997. Deeply loved and respected, he was then invited to head a new peace initiative, and was made Dean Emeritus. His funeral took place at the Cathedral, presided over by the Bishop and attended by senior representatives of all Christian churches in Jerusalem, amid clouds of incense, masses of flowers and superb singing.

IN TOUCH

autumn 2010

A devoted church musician liturgical music and lead the Chapel Choir. Ernie retired in 1991 after 45 years’ service to Guy’s and King’s. Highly distinguished in his field, Ernie held many posts outside King’s and received numerous honours. He was Organist of Southwark Cathedral from 1968 to 1976, and in 2006 he was awarded a Lambeth MA by the Archbishop of Canterbury in recognition of more than 40 years’ contribution to church music. King’s honoured Ernie with an FKC in 1979 and in 1991 he became an MBE. King’s continued to be dear to Ernie’s heart even into retirement, as he continued to direct choirs of former Chapel choral scholars. At a recent Chapel choir reunion, when everyone joined in to sing I Was Glad, Ernie was indeed a picture of gladness.

EH (Ernie) Warrell

King’s College London Organist (1953-1991) A professional church musician for nearly 70 years, Ernie Warrell spent much of his career at King’s and within the Diocese of Southwark, having begun his studies at Trinity College of Music in 1926 and continuing on to Southwark Cathedral in 1938. After the war as Assistant Organist at Southwark Cathedral, Ernie was also responsible for the organ in Guy’s chapel. There he met his wife Jean, a nurse at Guy’s. They married in 1952. Ernie was approached in 1953 by the Dean of King’s, Sydney Evans, to accept a Lectureship in Music and become College Organist. He would go on to train over 1,000 ordinands in

Sir Rustam ‘Mole’ Feroze

Professor Mervyn ‘Asprin’ Smith FKC

Brigadier Donald Fletcher

KCSMD, Medicine, 1946. One of the leading gynaecological surgeons of the postwar era – he performed the radical operation for cancer, Wertheim’s hysterectomy, ‘with cool and precise ease’ – Sir Rustam was a consultant at King’s College Hospital from 1952-85. He was also an inspirational teacher, much coveted by trainees. A delightful man – ‘last off the dance floor and first to the patient’ – he was knighted for services to medicine in 1983.

King’s, Professor of Chemical Pathology. A King’s man through and through, Mervyn was appointed to a personal chair in Biochemical Pharmacology in 1965, later becoming one of the first scientists in the country to run a clinical department when he was appointed Professor of Chemical Pathology in 1976. He was also sub-dean for undergraduate admissions for a period. He suffered fools not at all but had a knack of spotting and nurturing talent. He was rarely seen without a pipe and his jerseys were distinguished by their numerous tiny burn holes. He was, indeed, a character, and a valued mentor and friend to many colleagues.

King’s, Geography & Geology. Donald was awarded the MC when a young lieutenant in Burma in 1945. Under heavy fire, he rescued two injured comrades and was about to return for a third, when ordered to take cover. The citation stated that his courage and leadership was ‘beyond praise’.

Joyce Purcell MBE

First a girl about town and motor racing afficianado, then a wife and mother, then a Parliamentary secretary for 20 years, during which time she had tea with Gandhi and helped set up the British American Paralimentary Group, then a Sufi teacher, and then a physics graduate at 82, Joyce said at the age of 90: ‘Life is absolutely wonderful and there are so many things to do that you can’t come to the end of what the possibilities are.’ She died aged 99. Dr Hazel Egan (née Phillips)

Guy’s, Medicine, 1956. One of the earliest female students at Guy’s, Hazel departed shortly after qualifying – alone, by sea – for Nigeria, where she became the only doctor in a remote 100-bed mission hospital. On her first day, she was greeted by a queue of 2,000 people – the beginning of a varied, fruitful medical career.

George Brownlee

King’s, Professor of Pharmacology 1950-1978. Born in 1911 in Edinburgh, the son of a railway porter, George had to leave school at 15, but went to Glasgow University at 21 after taking six years of evening classes, while working as a pharmacist. He gained a BSc, then a PhD in London, and joined the Wellcome Trust, before taking up a Readership in Pharmacology at King’s, which he built into a ‘fine Department that touched many lives’ while continuing his research. He became a Professor in 1958 and retired in 1978. A proud Scotsman with a passionate belief in education, he was a serious but generous father to his three children – two of whom became Professors, the third a consultant in cardiac medicine.

Christopher Howard

Reader in History, King’s, 1937-1978. Christopher taught at King’s for over 40 years, mainly history and political ideas, but also languages. He supervised numerous MAs and PhDs, and wrote several books, including Splendid Isolation, on 19th-century British foreign policy, also co-editing the diary of Sir Edward Goschen, British Ambassador to Berlin prior to the First World War. He founded the staff cricket team and cherished fond memories of King’s, asking about it and his old colleagues and students right to the end. Air Marshal Sir Christopher Moran KCB

King’s, Defence Studies, 2001. Sir Christopher was one of the outstanding leaders in today’s RAF, and was widely recognised as a future Chief of the Air Staff. At the time of his sudden death – he collapsed while taking part in a triathlon – he occupied the second most senior post in the Service. A brilliant pilot and natural leader, even in his youth he possessed ‘a silkiness and charm that inspired all those around him’.

Email us at alumoff@.kcl.ac.uk

David Trigger Pharmacy, 1956 Glyn Downes Pharmacy, 1959 Stanley Campbell Education, 1977 Michael Symonds Physiology, 1979 Dr Janet Taylor Education 1983 Dr Georgina Henry (latterly Jolliffe)

Michael Smallcombe Dentistry, 1949 Dr B Plant Medicine & Surgery, 1949 John Petty Dentistry, 1951 Dr Geoffrey Skinner Medicine, 1952 Dr James Barrie Medicine, 1955 Serosh Sorabjee Dentistry, 1956 Dr Peter Pearce Medicine, 1959 Gerald De Silva Dentistry, 1959 Clive Brooks Dentistry, 1960 John Bason Dentistry, 1960 Professor David Harvey Medicine, 1960 Dr Crawford Jamieson Medicine, 1960 Anthony Prichard Dentistry, 1960 Dr Samarthiji Lal Medicine, 1962 Alan Blower Medicine, 1962 Dr Edward Bowen-Jones Medicine, 1962 Christopher Clegg Dentistry, 1962 David Evans Dentistry, 1967 Francis Chan Dentistry, 1971 Dr Geoffrey Clark Medicine, 1973 Caryl Sycamore (latterly Epps)

Pharmacy

Dentistry, 1976

Ian Sutton

Ymke Warren

Professor John Wing

King’s, English, 1952. A lifelong editor, highly respected by many distinguished authors, Ian was introduced to Thames & Hudson by Nikolaus Pevsner in 1960 – and there he stayed until leaving last year. Anthony Powell once described him as ‘rather inscrutable’; others have called him ‘the model of the oldfashioned, scholarly editor’, or even ‘a publisher’s editor from central casting. Tall, stooped and spectacled’, clad in tweed and corduroy. His contribution was so significant that, at times, he was effectively a co-author. A specialist in architecture, he penned two pseudonymous books in his spare time: Abbeys of Europe and Theatres: An Illustrated History, before Thames & Hudson published Western Architecture under his own name. He also edited The Victorian Society Annual for many years.

King’s, Biology, 1992. Primatologist Ymke Warren, 40, was murdered after confronting an intruder at her home in the coastal town of Limbe, Cameroon. She had been living in the west African country for four years, working as a director of a project studying Cross River gorillas, one of the region’s most threatened primates. In the 1990s, she worked at Rwanda’s Karisoke gorilla research station, made famous by Dian Fossey, who was herself murdered in 1985, and subsequently became the subject of the film Gorillas in the Mist. Ymke remained at her forest post throughout Rwanda’s genocidal civil war, and became acting director of Karisoke in 1999. Another passion was mountain climbing, and she once conquered Mounts Kilimanjaro, Kenya and Stanley in the space of a month.

Described as ‘one of the most internationally respected and successful psychiatrists of his generation’, Professor Wing was Director of the MRC Social Psychiatry Unit at the Institute of Psychiatry for 25 years, and helped to establish the institute as an internationally recognised leader in science discoveries and research.

Professor Arnold Beckett OBE

Ian Harris

A renowned pharmacist, Arnold was a pioneer of drug testing in sport, and was intimately involved in many of the Olympics drugs scandals over nearly 40 years. In 1959, he was appointed head of Chelsea College’s pharmacy department, which he developed into an impressive centre. In 1978, it became the first lab, established independently of any city staging the Olympic Games, to test for drugs in sport. During his 27 years at the college he supervised more than 100 PhD students, many of whom have subsequently had distinguished academic careers. He also had more than 450 publications in various prestigious scientific journals.

King’s, Mathematics, 1945; Lecturer in Education. Appointed to a Lectureship in Education at King’s with particular reference to maths, Ian had already had a distinguished career as a schoolmaster and as an energetic leader in the modern maths movement. He was a popular and successful tutor, and made major contributions to maths education through his work in the College, with the Association of Teachers of Mathematics, and especially his work in TV. When the Education Department became a fully-fledged College Faculty, he fittingly became its Sub-Dean, devising and supervising its activities with suitably mathematical precision.

Chelsea College

Guy’s William Vale Dentistry, 1936 Dr Harold Voss (latterly Voss Erd)

Medicine, 1939 Surgeon Rear-Admiral Albert Cadman

Dr Richard Horne Medicine, 1982 Dr Hugo Henderson Medicine, 1990

Institute of Psychiatry

Dentistry, 1941

Dr May Covitz (latterly Brenner)

Duncan Mackenzie Dentistry, 1941 Dr Frank Manning (latterly Manning Ae)

Psychology, 1953 Dr Sol Gordon Psychiatry, 1953 Dr Sulammith Wolff Psychological Medicine, 1958 Dr Judith Cuthill Psychological Medicine, 1964 Dr Montague Joyston-Bechal 1964 Dr David Pitcher Psychological Medicine, 1969

Medicine, 1941 Claude Eastes Medicine, 1942 Dr Hujohn Ripman Medicine, 1942 Richard Tipper Dentistry, 1942 Professor Wallace Fox Medicine, 1943 Henry Mistlin Dentistry, 1943 Dr Raymond Goulder Medicine, 1946 Dr Peter Smith Dentistry, 1947 Clifford Talbot Medicine, 1948 Dr Hywel Perkins Medicine, 1948

Dr Eileen Curry Dr Herbert Jones

Legendary philanthropist with an extraordinary legacy Dr Mortimer Sackler KBE FKC

Renowned businessman, philanthropist and Fellow of King’s College London, Dr Mortimer Sackler died on 24 March 2010 aged 93. Dr Sackler, who was born in New York, studied at Glasgow University and became a specialist in psychobiology. In the 1940s and 1950s he carried out seminal research in the biology of psychiatric illness and in 1952 took over the firm that was to become the giant Purdue Pharma with his two brothers, Arthur and Raymond, both also doctors and businessmen. Dr Sackler, who is survived by his wife Theresa, moved to Europe in

the 1970s and became well-known for his generous philanthropic gifts to a large number of academic and art institutions. Through The Dr Mortimer and Theresa Sackler Foundation, Dr and Mrs Sackler greatly enhanced the study and teaching of pharmacy at King’s with generous contributions to the Sackler Unit of Pulmonary Pharmacology and Sackler Institute of Pharmaceutical Sciences. In 2001 Dr Sackler was made an Honorary Fellow of King’s. King’s College London was not the only institution to benefit from Dr Sackler’s philanthropy. Indeed it has been estimated that £200 million of his family’s £500 million fortune from

Purdue Pharma was donated to charitable projects during his lifetime. In addition to the gifts to King’s, the Sacklers also made significant donations to the Guggenheim Museum, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, Tate, the Royal College of Art, the Ashmolean Museum, the National Gallery and the Louvre amongst many other institutions. Dr Sackler was awarded an honorary knighthood in 1999 in recognition of his philanthropy in Britain. Dr Sackler is also survived by a son and three daughters from two previous marriages, and a son and two daughters from his marriage to Theresa Sackler.

autumn 2010 IN TOUCH

Obituaries

Keep up-to-date with news and views from the King’s world at www.alumni.kcl.ac.uk

A friend of King’s Fellow of King’s College. Lord Wolfson, who died on 20 May aged 82, was chairman of both Great Universal Stores and the Wolfson Foundation, one of Britain’s biggest charitable trusts, which has contributed generously to King’s and its constituent institutions over the past half-century. Born in 1927 and educated at King’s School, Worcester, Leonard Wolfson was a founder trustee, along with his parents, of the Wolfson Foundation in 1955. Focused on the advancement of health, education, science, the arts and humanities, the trust has given away more than £1 billion (at current values) to date, and its current funds stand at £750 million. King’s own relationship with Lord Wolfson began when the

KCHSS

Francis Hanrott CBE English, 1947 Derek Fletcher

Foundation kindly supported the building of the Institute of Psychiatry, the centre of psychiatry in the UK. Under Lord Wolfson’s guidance, the Foundation’s remarkable philanthropic generosity has enabled a number of recent research and capital projects at King’s, including the Wolfson Centre for Age-Related Diseases, the Cicely Saunders Institute of Palliative Care and the Maurice Wohl Clinical Neuroscience Institute. Described as ‘fundamentally shy’ by the Daily Telegraph, Lord Wolfson’s ‘public style was low-key and punctilious, in contrast to that of his Glaswegian father, Sir Isaac Wolfson, who was one of the most rumbustious, charismatic and hard-driving entrepreneurs of the postwar era.’ It was Isaac, the son of a

Russian-Jewish immigrant, who built GUS into a potent retail empire. Leonard joined him in the business, ultimately becoming managing director in 1982, and joint chairman with his father in 1981, but took over the chairmanship after his father retired. Lord Wolfson retired in 1996. Lord Wolfson was President of the Jewish Welfare Board from 1972-1982, a Trustee of the Imperial War Museum and a patron of the Royal College of Surgeons. He was a Fellow of King’s College, and held numerous other honours from institutions in Britain and Israel. He was knighted in 1977 and created a life peer in 1985. He married first, in 1949, Ruth Sterling, with whom he had four daughters, and secondly, in 1991, Estelle Jackson (née Feldman).

Patricia Dee (latterly Lisle)

Normanby College

Chemical Engineering, 1948 The Hon Peter Kershaw Civil Engineering, 1948

Physiotherapy, 1962 Anthony Hicks AKC Mathematics, 1965 Canon Andrew Couch Theology, 1971 J Catherine Dolan French, 1972

Linda Stride (latterly Howle)

Jean Drayton (latterly De Comyn)

Elizabeth Oman (latterly Allison)

KCSMD

Geography, 1948

Theology & Religious Studies, 1973

The Revd Canon Wilfred Wilkinson AKC

Neila Millard (latterly Warner) AKC

Theology, 1950

English, 1974

Household & Social Sciences, 1953 Wendy Johnson (latterly Adair) Household & Social Sciences, 1954

Harold Griffith Dentistry, 1938 Peter Mayo Dentistry, 1945 Dr Basil Pickles Medicine, 1947 Dr Sidney Rowell Medicine, 1949 Dr R Petrie Medicine, 1952 Dr Travers Sayer AKC Medicine, 1957 Dr Michael Ayres Medicine, 1963 Dr Charles Gray Medicine, 1963 Professor David Smith Dentistry, 1963 Robin Wakeley Dentistry, 1963 Dr William Nobbs Medicine, 1965

The Revd Canon Thomas Evans AKC

Thomas Barrett Biophysics, 1975 James Greaves 1982 Guy Shanks 1986 Catherine Wilson Gerontology, 1988 Boguslaw Maziak Immunology, 1989 Adrian Springsguth Education, 1992 Lee Frisby Nursing Studies, 1993 Dr John Moores Theology & Religious

Frances Agate (latterly Agate-Smith)

Studies, 1993 Justin Olden Music, 1994 Kahlil Hazri Law, 1995 Dr George Bishop Advanced Computing, 1996 Alastair Foy Law, 1997 Sarah Lamping Biomedical Science, 1998 Dr Gordon Bird Medicine, 1999 John Barker European Community Competition Law, 2000 Olubukunola Olorunshola Law, 2001 Christopher Lockyer Palliative Care, 2002 Ravi Ramdas Biomedical Science, 2003 Captain Allan Ooi Aviation Medicine, 2008 David Gerszewski Philosophy, 2009 Muhammad Ahmed Medical Sciences, 2010

Margaret Barnes Nursing Studies, 1972 Samuel Osili Food Science, 1981

Joan Appleton (latterly Moore) Household

& Social Sciences, 1938

King’s Dr Charles Salkeld Chemistry, 1932 Dr John Jones Medicine & Surgery, 1934 J Kensley 1934 Michael Keelan Civil Engineering, 1935 Harold Allaway Civil Engineering, 1938 Muriel Bradforth (latterly Dean)

Geography, 1941 Dr Philip Holman Anatomy, Physiology,

Pharmacology & Biochemistry, 1942 Eileen Barrett (latterly Dalton)

French, 1943 Eileen-Marie Belderson (latterly Duell) AKC

French, 1944 Margaret Cumner (latterly Elliott) AKC

History, 1945 Clarice Dawson AKC Geography, 1944 Clive Mills AKC Electrical Engineering, 1945

Lord Wolfson FKC

IN TOUCH

autumn 2010

French, 1951 Dr William Hopkins Medicine, 1952 Kynvin Nixon Mechanical

Engineering, 1952 The Revd Herbert Haitley Theology, 1952 The Revd Peter Duncan Theology, 1952 The Rt Hon Dame Angela Rumbold DBE

Law, 1953 M Scott 1953 Albert Sadler Physics, 1953 Ian Adams French, 1953 John Kelly Theology, 1954 Ann Munkman (latterly Barker) General,

1954 Dr Philip Sherrard Modern Greek

Literature, 1955 Ronald Andrews Chemistry, 1955 Bernard Anderson Mathematics, 1956 Patricia Wood (latterly D’Arcy) Education, 1957 Terence Veal AKC Mathematics & Physics, 1957 Richard Hill Classics, 1957 Malcolm Thomas Engineering, 1958 James Wadley Spanish & French, 1959 Dr Ann Paxton Preclinical Medicine, 1959 Ian Bolt History, 1960 Nellie Seal French, 1960 John Carruthers Mathematics, 1961 Michel Willems FCA Engineering, 1962

Dr Basil Appleby Rosalind Bangham Medicine The Honourable Sir Harold Bollers Revd Alfred Willetts

Physiotherapy, 1985

Queen Elizabeth College St Thomas’ Dr Andrew Read Medicine, 1942 Dr William Cavenagh Medicine, 1943 Dr Thomas Ellis Medicine, 1945 Professor David Morley CBE

Medicine, 1947 Dr James Frew Medicine, 1948 Rolf Shepherd Medicine, 1949 David Perrins Medicine, 1950 Dr Ivone Kinross Medicine, 1951 Dr John Roberts Medicine, 1951 Dr Kenneth Thomson Medicine, 1951 Professor Eric Wilkes OBE Medicine, 1952 Dr John Humphreys Medicine, 1955 Dr David Sandilands Medicine, 1955 Dr Ian Wallace Medicine, 1959 Dr Andrew Hobbs Medicine, 1991 Dr Robert Pledger Medicine Dr Peter Smith Medicine

Logic puzzle The In Touch Logic Puzzle has become so popular that readers have formed their own Secret King’s Alumni Logic Puzzle Society (er, SKALPS). The group meets every first Tuesday of the month in an exclusive member’s club somewhere on the Strand Campus and, appropriately, you need a password to get in. College alumni Ben, Caterina, Helen and Hamid, who each consider themselves puzzle-solving sensations, form an orderly queue outside

the door. Ben knocks first and a woman answers and says, ‘News vote’, to which he replies, ‘Nine’ and is admitted. Then Caterina knocks and the woman reappears and says ‘Teething’, to which Caterina replies ‘Eighteen’ and is also let in. Next, Helen knocks, the woman says, ‘Teen hero’, Helen replies, ‘Four’ and in she goes too. Finally, Hamid knocks. The woman opens the door and says, ‘Even for us.’ What should Hamid say to follow his friends inside?

jason ford

Will our quartet of King’s puzzle solvers make it past the girl on the door? Only if they know the right answers to her questions…

Send your solutions to: Logic Puzzle, In Touch, King’s College London, Ground Floor Office, Strand Bridge House, 138-142 The Strand, London, WC2R 1HH or email intouch@kcl.ac.uk. The three best solutions received before 31 January 2011 will each win a £10 book token

Last issue’s puzzle… cold comfort

You might think that King’s student Alexandra stands a 95% chance of getting the new strain of the common cold, but she really has a 95% chance of escaping it. If the test devised by the brilliant King’s researcher is 95% accurate, of all of the people who have succumbed to the virus it will correctly identify 95% and incorrectly tell 5% they are healthy. More importantly for Alexandra, of all the people who have escaped the virus, it will correctly give 95% of them the all-clear – and worry 5% with a false positive.

One person in 350 has the virus, so if you test one million people there will be 2857 future sufferers. That means 997,143 will evade the bug. So the test will produce correct positive results for 95% of the infected, which is 2714 people, and false positives for 5% of the healthy, which is 49,857. Alexandra hopes she is one of these worried 52,571 people. Her chance of dodging the bug is therefore the ratio of false positives to all positives. That’s 49,857 divided by 52,571 – which works out at a 95% chance of being cold-free.

Once again we had lots of entries, most of whom heroically navigated their way to arrive at such simple mathematical equations as: ((349x5)/350)/ (((349x5)/350) + (95/350)) = 4.986/(4.986 + 0.271) = 4.986/ 5.257 = 0.948 or 94.8% (chance of not getting the bug). And we’re not about to disagree. The winners are: Melissa Macdonald (King’s, Maths PGCE, 2009); Greta James (Chelsea College, Pharmacy, 1982); Gwyn Owen (King’s, Construction Law & Arbitration). Their entries can be found at www.alumni.kcl.ac.uk autumn 2010 IN TOUCH

Letters We always love to hear from our readers, so please drop us a line. The best letter wins a £20 book token. We reserve the right to edit for space and clarity. Write to intouch@ kcl.ac.uk or Letters, In Touch, King’s College London, Ground Floor Office, Strand Bridge House, 138-142 The Strand, London, WC2R 1HH

him on the terrace that afternoon, where, over a plate of strawberries, we exchanged thoughts on his creative writing course, his screenplay work, and the experience of King’s English students today, as compared with mine some almost 30 years ago. Pamela Temple (King’s, English, 1982)

UNEXPECTEDLY HELPING MYSELF

Prize letter

MAGNIFICENT MONTY

Field Marshall Lord Montgomery was giving the inaugural address at King’s. The luncheon hall was packed to overflowing and the two main doors secured by the College attendants. The throng outside threatened to push their way in, the noise was deafening and the Principal and staff were increasingly perplexed and nervous. Monty rose from his seat and commanded, ‘Open those doors!’ He watched as the mass of enthusiastic students burst in, ordering them to ‘settle down! Sit on the floor and keep quiet’. Order was restored. This takes me back to Monty’s address to the officers taking part in D-Day when I was a young captain in an infantry battalion. He entered the hall and said, ‘Gentlemen, I want you all to cough for the next five minutes.’ When the coughing period was over he then said, ‘I don’t want to hear another cough while I’m talking!’ Monty will always be my hero. Dr Douglas LJ Bilbey (King’s, Anatomy, PhD, 1958; ex-Reader in Anatomy and Sub-Dean of Medical Science) l Can you remember a visit by the great and good? Please write to us and let us know…

I was a student at King’s 1954-60 collecting a BSc and PhD in Chemistry. Along the way I was awarded my University Purple for athletics in 1955, captained King’s in athletics in 1956 and London University in 1957. After a fellowship at Brandeis University I joined the Atomic Weapons Research Establishment in late 1961 and undertook research in materials science. By 1967, having established a reputation in the science of corrosion, I was asked by an official from the Department of Health to assist with a problem being encountered with metal implants in the body. My team undertook the first ever examination of broken implants and found that the quality of the surgery, the composition of the implant and even the surface finish of the metal all contributed to the performance of the implant in the body. In some cases the implant had to be removed because it broke due to corrosion, stress corrosion, or corrosion fatigue. In other cases the implant caused an allergic reaction in the patient. Our research led to a significant involvement of my group in the specification and design of implants. We found that generally titanium was the least likely material to lead to complications. Fast forward 43 years and I unexpectedly benefited from my efforts to improve implant design. A fall down a flight of stairs left me with a broken hip. The following morning I had a new titanium hip implanted and three weeks later was back to driving. By five weeks I was able to walk without any aids and now hope to resume playing tennis within a few weeks. I certainly never expected to test our recommendations in this manner, but am delighted with the results. Dr Stanley Orman (King’s, Chemistry, 1957; 1960)

A PROFESSOR REMEMBERED Jason Ford

I was saddened to read of the death of Professor David Nokes in the Spring 2010 edition of In Touch. I studied English at King’s, graduating in 1982, and remember well his distinctively enthusiastic lecturing style and humour, encouraging many of us to explore the works of Defoe, Swift, Richardson and Pope. I enjoyed his lecture on Samuel Johnson at last year’s Alumni Weekend, a session which exposed a number of new insights on Johnson’s marriage, and proved that Professor Nokes had lost none of his enthusiasm for his subject. I had a long chat with 58

IN TOUCH

autumn 2010

One small step for man, one giant leap for Stanley

PHOTOGRAPHY BY SUKI DHANDA

This I’ve learned

irene higginson

Cicely said: ‘You matter because you are you and you matter all your life’

Professor Irene Higginson OBE is Director of the newly launched Cicely Saunders Institute of Palliative Care at King’s. Named after the late Dame Cicely Saunders (St Thomas’, Medicine 1957), pioneer of the hospice movement and former colleague of Professor Higginson, the Institute is the only organisation in the world solely dedicated to the research and improvement of services in end of life care. Amanda Calberry takes notes.

‘People are frightened about hospices and tend to think that they’re places that everybody goes to die. I remember vividly the family of one patient saying “Don’t tell him he’s here!” To dispel some of the rumours about hospices, half of the patients go there to have their symptoms managed and then go home. If somebody thinks that hospices are all about dying, the answer to that is that they are all about living. Palliative care is all about helping people to live well for as long as they can, accepting that at some point you will have to try and help them die well. I don’t think that death can ever be good, but it can be more appropriate, the family supported and the patient’s symptoms managed.’ ‘In the UK there are only 200 hospices and only 3,200 hospice beds: there are about half a million deaths per year and 80 per cent are from chronic or progressive diseases. Only about four per cent of the total UK population die in hospices. A major challenge is that the need for palliative care is going to increase dramatically. In the coming years the number of deaths from non-communicable conditions

will increase by 17 per cent. Also, the more we develop treatments for conditions, the longer people live with their illness. Paradoxically, the more medicine discovers, the greater the need for palliative care. However, when resources are being doled out, palliative care often isn’t a priority, though interestingly it is for the public. It’s a big challenge to move from it being Cinderella to mainstream.’ ‘One of our projects is helping people to be more confident in asking questions. It’s easy to say things in a way that the patient will understand differently. For example, “We’ve been giving you this treatment and the tumour hasn’t changed very much.” Does that mean that the treatment hasn’t worked because the tumour is still there or has the treatment stopped the tumour growing? It’s very easy for information to be misunderstood.’ ‘One of the great things about Cicely Saunders was that she was always interested in the person as well as the job they were doing. She was very smart and experienced but also very thoughtful. Her vision of doing things inspired me. I know it sounds corny but I do sometimes think “What would Cicely do?”.’ ‘The most important things that you can do for an end of life patient are listen, alleviate their symptoms, support them and their family and give them dignity. As Cicely said, “You matter because you are you and you matter all the days of your life”.’ autumn 2010 IN TOUCH

Depression Superpower Cancer Read more? www.kcl.ac.uk/kingsanswers Join the world questions debate online! Tell us your world question Watch the highlights from our 3 November launch event featuring David Dimbleby and Archbishop Desmond Tutu Read about our international poll results www.kcl.ac.uk/kingsanswers IN TOUCH Spring 2010 IFC4