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Managers and Governance at Rothamsted Research

Institute Director

› Maurice Moloney

Institute Executive Committee

› Maurice Moloney (Director)
› Stephen James
› Martin Parry
› Johnathan Napier
› Keith Goulding
› Angela Karp

Lawes Agricultural Trust Company Limited Board of Directors

› Lord De Ramsey DL (Chairman)
› Professor David Baulcombe FRS
› Lord Curry of Kirkharle
› Lord Cameron of Dillington DL, FRICS
› Professor E C Cocking DSc, FRS
› Lord Haskins of Skidby

Rothamsted Research Board of Directors

Click a board member's name for a potted biography

› Professor Nick Talbot (Chairman)
› Dr Graham Birch (Deputy Chairman)
› Professor Michael Elves DSc
› Professor Mark Bailey
› Professor Richard Bardgett
› Dr David Brightman
› Mr Philip W Chamberlain
› Professor Edward C Cocking DSc, FRS
› Miss Caroline Drummond
› Mr Jonathan Flowers
› Dr David Lawrence
› Mr Paul Leonard
› Professor Sir David J Read FRS

Nicholas Talbot

Professor Talbot is Deputy Vice-Chancellor for Research and Knowledge Transfer. He graduated in Microbiology from the University of Wales, Swansea and received his PhD in Molecular Genetics from the University of East Anglia. After a period of postdoctoral research at Purdue University in the USA he moved to the University of Exeter, becoming Professor of Molecular Genetics in 1999, Head of the School of Biosciences in 2005, and Deputy Vice Chancellor in 2010. As DVC for Research and Knowledge Transfer, Nick chairs the University Ethics Committee, the Science Strategy Executive Board and line manages the Colleges of Life and Environmental Sciences and Engineering, Mathematics and Physical Sciences.

Professor Talbot's research is focused on the biology of plant diseases. He utilizes a range of cell biology, genetics and genomics approaches in his research which has been supported by the BBSRC continuously since 1994. He has authored more than 100 scientific papers and reviews and received research fellowships from EMBO and the Nuffield Foundation. He won the Berkeley Award from the British Mycological Society in 1999, the Society for Experimental Biology President's Medal for outstanding original research in cell biology in 2000 and was the Karling Award Lecturer of the Mycological Society of America in 2008.

Professor Talbot has served on a wide variety of grant panels, reviews and visiting groups for BBSRC, MRC and the EU. He is currently Chair of the Board of Directors of BBSRC Rothamsted Research and a member of the Council of the Sainsbury Laboratory. He has served as an editor of The Plant Cell, The New Phytologist and an editorial board member of Molecular Microbiology.

Graham Birch (Deputy Chairman)

Graham Birch obtained a BSc in Mining Geology from Imperial College in 1981, before gaining a PhD also from Imperial College in 1984. His career in the City has been spent mostly in stock broking and finance, sprecialising in the natural resources sector. Since 1993, he has been concentrating on asset management and until 2009 headed the natural resources investment team at BlackRock in London. At BlackRock he was responsible for portfolios with investments in precious metals, base metals and agriculture. Graham is a non-executive director of two publicly traded companies - Hochschild Mining plc and Petropavlovsk plc and an asset management company - ETF Securities. Graham Birch also owns a 2,100 acre mixed dairy and arable farm in Dorset.

Michael Elves

Professor Elves obtained a B.Sc in Zoology, Physiology, Chemistry and Law at the University of Nottingham, before gaining a Ph.D. in Haematology and Cytogenetics at Victoria University of Manchester, then an LL.B at the University of London. He has a number of honorary and scientific distinctions. His academic career was in the University of Manchester, the Robert Jones and Agnes Orthopaedic Hospital's research centre and the Institute of Orthopaedics, University of London, where he was Reader in Immunology. His career in Glaxo commenced in 1978 as Head of the Immunobiology Department, becoming Director of the Mammalian Biology Division, and then Director of the Cellular Sciences Division. In 1993 he became Director of Group Scientific Affairs of Glaxo Holdings plc, then Director of Scientific and Educational Affairs of Glaxo Wellcome plc until his retirement. He was the founder Chairman of the Edward Jenner Institute for Vaccine Research, retiring from that post in 2001 and was a member of the Governing Body of the Animal Health Institute. He has held non-executive Board positions in the biotechnology sector. He is presently a Governor of the University of Hertfordshire and is a special adviser to the House of Commons Science and Technology Committee. He has participated in numerous industry bodies.

Mark Bailey

Professor Mark Bailey (Director, Natural Environment Research Council, Centre for Ecology & Hydrology). After graduating with a degree in microbiology (Manchester Polytechnic) and a PhD in insect virology (Reading University), Mark spent four years as a postdoctoral fellow at Birmingham University studying the molecular pathogenicity of bacterial infections before moving to Oxford to establish the Molecular Microbial Ecology Group. In 2002, he was appointed Director of CEH-Oxford (The Institute of Virology and Environmental Microbiology), before becoming Science Director for the CEH Biodiversity Programme in 2003. Mark has been a member of a number of national and international peer review panels, was a member of ACRE (1999-2009) and is an inaugural Fellow of the Society of Biology and an elected Fellow of the American Academy of Microbiology. He is Visiting Professor, School of Plant and Animal Sciences, at the University of Sheffield; Honorary Professor, School of Biosciences, Cardiff University; and Visiting Professor, Department of Agricultural and Engineering Sciences, Newcastle. He is also a member of the Board of Trustees for the National Biodiversity Network and Rothamsted Research, Chairs the Steering Committee for the Environmental Change Network and Editor of The ISME-J, the lead microbial ecology journal. His research focus has been the development and application of molecular genetics and metagenomics to study the underlying principals of microbial ecology, microbial community dynamics, ecosystem function, habitat-regulated gene expression, the functional activity of communities and the evolutionary relevance of the horizontal gene pool. Key interests include biogeochemical cycling, functional diversity and microbial metagenomics in the study of soil-plant-microbe interactions, and the wider application of molecular ecology in the environmental sciences. Broader interests include the general ecology of systems and multi-scale trophic interactions, and the role and relevance of biodiversity and natural capital in sustaining our planet.

Richard Bardgett

Richard Bardgett graduated from the University of Newcastle-upon-Tyne in 1987 with an Honours degree in Soil and Land Resource Science, and then moved to Lancaster University where he gained his PhD in 1991. Afterwards, he held posts at the Institute of Grassland and Environmental Research and Manchester University, before returning to Lancaster University where he is now Professor of Ecology. His primary research interest is the study of plant-soil relationships in the context of nutrient cycling and plant community dynamics in natural and managed ecosystems. He has published many papers on this topic and three books, including the recently (2010) published 'Aboveground-Belowground Linkages: Biotic Interactions, Ecosystem Processes, and Global Change". Richard is Editor of Journal of Ecology and serves on the Editorial Boards of Ecology Letters and Ecosystems. He is Vice President of the British Ecological Society, Chair of BBSRC's Committee B, and a member of the Netherlands Institute of Ecology Scientific Advisory Board. Richard is a Highly Cited Scientist in the area of Environment/Ecology, an honorary Fellow of the Royal Society of New Zealand, and Fellow of the Society of Biology..

David Brightman

Dr Brightman graduated from the University of Newcastle upon Tyne in 1977 with Honours in animal production and science. He was awarded a PhD from the University of Nottingham in 1983 in Dietary Nitrogen Requirements of Entire Male Cattle. Since 1982, he has been self employed on the family farm at Gaydon Hill Farm in Warwickshire producing mainly milling wheat, oilseeds and pulses. He has always been active in the NFU and was Chairman of the NFU Pesticides Working Group and a member of the NFU Technical Services Committee from 1995-2003. He became a member of the Sustainable Arable LINK Programme Management Committee in 1997 and a member of the ACRE subgroup on wider biodiversity issues of releases to the environment. He was a director of Centaur Producers Ltd for two years leading up to the merger which formed Openfield. He was a Director of ARIA, subsequently Rothamsted Research Association (RRA) from 1990-2005 after which he joined the main board of Rothamsted Research. He was Chairman of RRA from 2001-2003. He was appointed as a BBSRC Council Member in 2003 and completed two terms in 2009 subsequently being an independant member of the BBSRC Audit Board and the Shared Service Centre Project Audit Committee. He was a member of the Knowledge Transfer Panel reviewing all BBSRC Institutes for the Institute Assessment Exercise 2005 and was a member of the Sustainable Agriculture Strategy Panel, advising Council on future strategy of agricultural research and coordination of funding. He was also a member of the Crop Science Initiative Assessment Panel responsible for allocation of £13m to a new programme of crop research. He was awarded a Fellowship of the Society of Biology in 2005 and a Fellowship of the Royal Agricultural Societies in 2011.

Philip Chamberlain

Philip Chamberlain has been Managing Director of Crowmarsh Battle Farms Limited, a family farming company, since 1975. He farms 3,300 acres of combinable crops - wheat, barley, oilseed rape, peas, beans and linseed. - in the Wallingford area of south Oxfordshire. Since 1996, the farm has been a LEAF Demonstration Farm ( Linking Farming and the Environment ) and it is a participant in the Countryside Stewardship Scheme.

Edward Cocking

Professor Cocking obtained a First Class degree in Biological Chemistry and his Ph.D. at the University of Bristol. Shortly thereafter he commenced his lifelong association with the University of Nottingham, becoming in due course Dean of the Faculty of Science and, now, Director of the Centre for Crop Nitrogen Fixation. He was elected to a Fellowship of the Royal Society in 1983 and Membership of Academia Europaea in 1993. He has been a member of numerous academic and research bodies including periods as a Member of Council of AFRC, Trustee of the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew and Member of Council of the Royal Society. He was recently elected a Fellow of the World Innovation Foundation in recognition of his research on nitrogen fixation in cereals. He is also a Fellow of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences and of the Indian Academy of Agricultural Sciences.

Caroline Drummond

Caroline Drummond has been running the farming and environmental charity LEAF (Linking Environment And Farming). She has been running LEAF since it started in 1991. She graduated in Agriculture and has broad practical agricultural experience gained from both the UK and overseas. Her work at LEAF focuses on encouraging more sustainable farming practices and building a better public trust and understanding of farming and the environment - values that she is personally passionate about.

LEAF supports farmers with technical management tools, marketing opportunities with LEAF Marque and knowledge exchange through a network of LEAF Demonstration Farms, running Open Farm Sunday and the project Let Nature Feed Your Senses, engaging young, old and disabled groups out on farm through sensory rich experiences.

20% of UK fruit and vegetables are now LEAF Marque accredited and the Marque now operates in some 50 countries. Furthermore, in 2011 over 360 farms welcomed more than 120,000 members of the public into the countryside, and over the last 6 years nearly 1 million members of the public have 'discovered more' about farming and nature through the success of Open Farm Sunday.

Caroline was Chairman for the 2005 Oxford Farming Conference and is a Trustee for CPRE, the Royal Agricultural College, Rothamsted and British Nutrition Foundation and also sits on Defra's Civil Society Advisory Board. She is a Fellow of the Royal Agricultural Societies (FRAgS), a Fellow of the Institute of Agricultural Management, and Chartered Environmentalist and a director for LEAF Marque.

In the Queen's Birthday Honours (2009) Caroline was awarded the MBE for services to the agricultural industry. Caroline is married to a dairy farmer and they have a young daughter.

Jonathan Flowers

Jonathan obtained a BSc in Mathematics from Manchester University, and an MSc in Operational Research from Lancaster University, before joining NatWest Group where he undertook an MBA at London Business School. He worked in Consultancy, rising to lead the internal consultancy group, as Commercial Development Director in the Credit Card business and then as a Strategy Executive. Following a career break year and a Postgraduate Diploma in Art History at the Courtauld Institute he made a significant shift to work as Director of Culture Change at the London Borough of Lambeth, then as Deputy Chief Executive at Bedfordshire County Council, before moving to his present Partner-level role at Veredus, the senior headhunting/advisory arm of the Capita Group where he leads the Local Government team and specialises cross-sector in Chief Executive and Board appointments, and top team development. He is a Fellow of the Chartered Management Institute, the OR Society and the RSA.

David Lawrence

Member of the Lead Expert Group on Food and Farming. Graduated in chemistry from Oxford University with an MA and DPhil in chemical pharmacology.

Joined ICI in 1974, where he worked as a chemist and biochemist and, unusually, across the span of chemistry, seeds and biological control. Held a variety of people and project management roles, culminating in his position as Head of International R&D Projects in Zeneca Agrochemicals, prior to the Syngenta merger in 2000.

Became head of R&D Projects on the formation of Syngenta, then a member of the Syngenta Executive Committee and Head of R&D in Syngenta (2002-2009), with responsibility across chemical, biotechnology and plant breeding. On retirement from Syngenta in April 2009, after 35 years in the industry, he was elected as a non-executive director of Syngenta AG, and chair of the Syngenta Science & Technology Advisory Board.

He is also a member of the BBSRC Council, chairing the Industrial Biotechnology Strategy Panel and the Industrial Biotechnology Leadership Forum. He is a Board member for Rothamsted Research, Plastid AS (Norway) and the Biosciences Knowledge Transfer Network for which he chairs the sector group on industrial biotechnology. .

Paul Leonard

After graduating in Zoology from Bristol University, Paul Leonard moved to London University's Imperial College, where he was awarded an MSc in Applied Entomology. Following his studies, he joined Dow Chemical, where he worked as an agricultural entomologist for nearly ten years. During this time, he was deeply involved in establishing the global Insecticide Resistance Action Committee, which he chaired for three years. In 1994, he moved to American Cyanamid, where he was appointed European Insecticide Technical Manager, during which time he had regular contact with Rothamsted Research. In 1999, he was appointed Director Regulatory Affairs. American Cyanamid was purchased by BASF In 2000, after which he established an "Alliance Management" function to outsource regulatory and scientific work. In 2004 he was awarded an MBA by the Open University Business School. In 1997 he transferred to BASF's Communications and Government Relations, based on Brussels, where he is now Head of Technology and Innovation policy. In this capacity he is in regular contact with stakeholders, including the European institutions, non-governmental organisations and trade associations. He is on the board of the British Chamber of Commerce in Belgium, where he chairs the Food Security Safety and Sustainability Task Force.

David Read (Chairman)

Professor Read was knighted for services to Biological Science in the 2007 Queen's Birthday Honours list. He graduated in Botany and Zoology from the University of Hull where he also obtained his Ph.D. He commenced his lifelong association with the University of Sheffield in 1963 as Junior Research Fellow, becoming Lecturer, Senior Lecturer, Reader and now Professor of Plant Sciences in the Department of Animal and Plant Sciences. His special interests are soil microbial ecology and physiology, root-fungal symbioses, plant nutrition and pollution biology. He has published over 200 papers in peer reviewed journals on these topics, is an ISI 'highly cited' researcher and the co-author of the seminal text in his specialist area of research 'Mycorrhizal Symbiosis' (Academic Press). Professor Read was elected to the Fellowship of the Royal Society in 1990. Other Honours include Election as honorary Member of the American Mycological Society (2000), Award of the Francis E Clark Distinguished Lectureship on Frontiers of Soil Science by the Soil Science Society of America (2001), and Award of the Kempe Prize in Ecology, Sweden (2002). He is a past Chair of the RRes Board, has held the following executive positions: Vice President and Biological Secretary of the Royal Society (2003-2008); Member of Council, NERC; Member of Board of Governors of the Macaulay Institute and Chairman of the Forestry Commission's Advisory Committee on Forest Research. He currently holds a George Winthrop Visiting Research Professorship in the University of Western Australia and an Emeritus Chair of Plant Sciences in the University of Sheffield. .