The Royal Society is a self-governing Fellowship made up of the most eminent scientists, engineers and technologists from the UK and the Commonwealth. Fellows and Foreign Members are elected for life through a peer review process on the basis of excellence in science.
The following Old Shirburnians have been elected Fellows of the Royal Society (FRS):
Derman Guy Christopherson OBE Kt DPhil FIMechE FRS (1915-2000) – engineer.
Attended Sherborne School (School House) 1928-1934.
Elected to the Fellowship of the Royal Society, 24 March 1960:
Citation: Early came into prominence for his work on the application of relaxation methods to the solution of some differential equations of theoretical physics. During the war did valuable work on the effects of explosions on structures, and also contributed to the development of new explosive weapons. Distinguished since for his research on plasticity, metal cutting, dynamic stresses and on fluid lubrication at very high pressures. All his work shows marked physical insight and mathematical facility.
Proposers: Alfred Grenville Pugsley; John Fleetwood Baker; Richard Vynne Southwell; Frank Philip Bowden; Dennis Gabor; Alan Arnold Griffith; Leslie Howarth.
Robin Francis Irvine PhD FMedSci FRS (b.1950) – biochemist.
Attended Sherborne School (Harper House) 1963-1968.
Elected to the Fellowship of the Royal Society, 1993:
Citation: Robin Irvine is renowned for his contributions to the study of the biological functions of phospholipids and, in particular, the phosphoinositide signalling mechanism — now recognised as being central to many cellular processes. A number of his discoveries have significantly advanced the field. He helped to establish inositol 1,4,5-trisphosphate as a secondary messenger that regulates the mobilisation of calcium within the cell. By establishing techniques for the separation and analysis of inositol phosphates generated by cells, Robin laid the experimental and conceptual foundations for an expansion in our understanding of the inositol-containing phospholipids, known as inositides. Robin went on to identify routes to inositide metabolism, characterising the enzymes that form them and identifying potential effectors. He has published his research extensively and over ten of his papers have been accepted by the scientific journal Nature. His work has received over 35,000 citations in the scientific literature. He has also been invited to speak about his findings at a number of prestigious conferences.
Philip Kelland MA FRS (1808-1879) – mathematician.
Attended Sherborne School in the 1820s.
Elected to the Fellowship of the Royal Society, 6 December 1838:
Citation: Revd. Philip Kelland MA Fellow and Tutor of Queens College Cambridge, and author of several papers on the Theory of Light and other branches of Physical Science, contained in Part II of Vol VI of the Transactions of the Cambridge Philosophical Society, being desirous of becoming a Fellow of the Royal Society of London, we whose names are undersigned do hereby certify from our personal knowledge that we consider him worthy of that honor & as likely to prove an useful and valuable Member.
Proposers: William Hopkins; George Fisher; William Hallowes Miller; George Biddell Airy; George Peacock; Everard Home; Josh Bosworth; John James Audubon; James David Forbes; Edward Sabine; Baden Powell.
Lionel Alexander Bethune Pilkington (Alastair Pilkington) Kt FRS (1920-1995) – glass technologist.
Attended Sherborne School (Lyon House) 1933-1938.
Elected to the Fellowship of the Royal Society, 20 March 1969:
Citation: For many years glass manufacturers have sought a method of making flat glass sheet that avoided the need to grind and polish it. In 1952 Alastair Pilkington conceived the idea of floating a continuous ribbon of glass on molten metal so that both surfaces would be truly flat. The development of the idea involved formidable difficulties at each stage of laboratory, pilot plant and commercial production. It was not until 1959 that the successful full-scale output was achieved. The use of an applied electromotive force avoided certain difficulties arising at the tin/glass interface and also enabled the characteristics of the glass to be changed by introducing different metallic ions at a rapid rate. Since then the process has been improved to give greater flexibility and different types of glass. It has now been licensed by every large plate glass manufacturer in the world. In this field Britain has an unchallenged supremacy. In all this Pilkington was the leader of the development teams and their success has been due largely to his ingenuity in overcoming difficulties and to his courage in sustaining a persistent effort over several years, without any assurance that ultimate success would be achieved.
Mark Felton Randolph PhD FRS (b.1951) – geotechnical engineer.
Son of J.H. Randolph, Assistant Master and Housemaster (Abbeylands) at Sherborne School.
Attended Sherborne School (Abbey House) 1964-1969.
Elected to the Fellowship of the Royal Society, 2011:
Citation: Mark Randolph is a geotechnical engineer who specialises in foundation systems for offshore structures used by the oil and gas industry. His work, which incorporates analysis, computation, experimentation and software development, has helped to produce more advanced designs for piled foundations. Other highlights of Mark’s work include research on the finite element analysis of soil penetration. He has also applied plasticity theory to geotechnical design and worked on the foundation issues of calcareous materials off of the Australian Coast. Mark has won many awards in recognition of his work, including the David Hislop Award of the Institution of Civil Engineers in 2011 and the Centenary Medal of Australia in 2003. In addition to being a Fellow of the Royal Society, he has also been elected as a Fellow of the Australian Academy of Science, the Australian Academy of Technological Sciences and Engineering and the Royal Academy of Engineering.
Henry William Lloyd Tanner FRS FRAS (1851-1915) – mathematician and astronomer.
Assistant master at Sherborne School, 1873-1875 – the school’s first science master.
Professor of Mathematics and Astronomy, University College of South Wales and Monmouthshire (now Cardiff University), 1883-1909.
Elected to the Fellowship of the Royal Society, 1 June 1899:
Citation: Professor of Mathematics and Astronomy in the University College of South Wales and Monmouthshire. Member (and sometime Member of Council) of the London Mathematical Society. Distinguished as a mathematical investigator. Author of several papers on ‘Differential Equations’ (Proceedings of the London Mathematical Society, vols vii, viii, ix, x, xi; Quarterly Journal of Mathematics, vol xvi; Mess Math, vols v, vi, vii); ‘On Determinants of ‘n’ Dimensions’ (Proceedings of the London Mathematical Society, vol x); ‘On the Coordinates of a Plane Curve in Space’ (ibid, vol xiii); ‘On the Function (ax + b) (cx + d)’ (Mess Math, vol ix); ‘On Spherical Trigonometry’ (ibid, vol xiv); ‘Sturm’s Theorem’ (ibid, vol xviii); ‘Solution of (a,b, . . ., c)=(a^p, b^p, . . ., c^p)’ (ibid, vol xix); ‘Arbogast’s Rule’ (ibid, vol xx); ‘Square Roots of Unity for a Prime Modulus’ (ibid, xxi); ‘Quinquisection of x^p-1’ (Proceedings of the London Mathematical Society, vol xviii); ‘Cyclotomic Functions (ibid, vol xx); ‘Approximate Evolution’ (ibid, vol xxiii); ‘Complex Primes formed with Fifth Roots of Unity’ (ibid, vol xxiv).
Proposers: [B. Price]; William Esson; Edwin Bailey Elliott; Percy Alexander MacMahon; Olaus Henrici; James Whitbread Lee Glaisher; [James Joseph Sylvester]; John James Walker; Alfred Bray Kempe; Robert Harley; R.B, Clifton; J.V. Jones; Andrew Russell Forsyth.
Alan Mathison Turing OBE PhD FRS (1912-1954) – mathematician & computer scientist.
Attended Sherborne School (Westcott House) 1926-1931.
Elected to the Fellowship of the Royal Society, 15 March 1951:
Citation: Distinguished for his contributions to mathematical logic. His papers on ‘Computable numbers’ in 1936 and following years in which he gave precise meaning to the notion of a ‘constructive process’ in terms of the abstract specification of a computing machine, have had a profound influence, first in mathematical logic in this and other countries (USA, USSR) by shewing the impossibility of solving certain problems such as Hilbert’s ‘Entscheidungs problem’; and secondly in the use and design of actual automatic computing machines on which he has worked since 1945.
Proposers: Maxwell Herman Alexander Newman (proposer); Bertrand Russell (seconder); John Henry Constantine Whitehead; William Vallance Douglas Hodge; Abram Samoilovitch Besicovitch; Albert Edward Ingham; Philip Hall; Charles Galton Darwin.
Alfred North Whitehead OM FRS (1861-1947) – mathematician & philosopher.
Attended Sherborne School (School House) 1875-1880.
Elected to the Fellowship of the Royal Society, 11 June 1903:
Citation: Fellow and Mathematical Lecturer of Trinity College, Cambridge. Author of A Treatise on Universal Algebra, with Applications (this Treatise received an honourable mention for the Lobatchewski Prize, 1900), and of the following Papers, among others: – ‘On the Motion of Viscous Incompressible Fluids’ (Quarterly Journal, vol xxiii); ‘Second Approximations to Viscous Fluid Motion’ (ibid, vol. xxiii); ‘The Geodesic Geometry of surfaces in Non-Euclidian Space’ (Proceedings of the London Math. Society, vol. xxix); ‘Memoir on the Algebra of Symbolic Logic’ (American Journal of Mathematics, vol. xxiii).
Proposers: Andrew Russell Forsyth; William Burnside; Robert Stawell Ball; James Whitbread Lee Gaisher; Edward John Routh; Ernest William Hobson; Augustus Edward Hough Love; Henry Frederick Baker; George Howard Darwin.
Rachel Hassall
Archivist, Sherborne School
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