Imperial romance: Basil and Paula Allsopp (née Groom)

Chemistry practical classes in the early 1960s involved much weighing at a couple of antique balances on the lecturer's desk and I frequently tripped over the feet of a young man who always stood, splay footed.

Chemistry practical classes in the early 1960s involved much weighing at a couple of antique balances on the lecturer's desk and I frequently tripped over the feet of a young man who always stood, splay footed, as he weighed his chemicals when I was going to weigh mine. It was thus not difficult to get to know Basil (Chemistry 1963, PhD 1967) during class time, and this gradually spread to weekends and afternoons sailing on the Welsh Harp.

We both enjoyed music and as I was already a member of the College choir, I persuaded him to join as well and during one summer vacation, we found ourselves working in the same pharmaceutical laboratory in Dagenham. Fine weekends during this time were taken up with mad cycle rides across the marshy wastes of wildest Essex. Despite spending a lot of time together, we did both get degrees and Basil went on to do a PhD, while I taught Chemistry, Physics and Maths at a Grammar school.

We married in 1965 and just over two years and two children later, we left for a two-year stint in Uganda, which stretched to nearly five years, followed by 13 years in Kenya. Then followed six years in Cambridge for Basil, while I, having given up teaching in favour of laboratory work during our last few years in Kenya, worked first as a lowly clinical biochemistry laboratory technician, during which time I developed a talent for DNA sequencing, so then moved to a university research post in London.

Basil's speciality, veterinary tropical diseases, was not much in demand in England at the end of his contract in Cambridge and in 1991 we were both offered posts at the Onderstepoort Veterinary Research Institute, just outside Pretoria, South Africa. The following years were scientifically highly productive for both of us, with a PhD for me in 1994 and several research publications. As head of the Molecular Biology division, Basil successfully obtained several substantial research funds which enabled his scientific team, of which I was a member, to complete the genome sequence of the intracellular bacterium Ehrlichia ruminantium. This was an exciting time as there were several other groups sequencing ehrlichial genomes but ours was published first, probably because nobody expected a team from darkest Africa to succeed in such a project.

Inevitably, retirement loomed and although our lifestyle in South Africa was very pleasant, we felt the need to return to Europe and at the end of 2008 we moved to the South of France where we look forward to a whole new series of places to explore together.

Paula Allsopp (Chemistry 1963)