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Alan M. Roberts

Alan Madoc Roberts FRS.jpg
Roberts in 2015
Born
Alan Madoc Roberts

(1941-08-24) 24 August 1941 (age 83)
Alma mater
Awards
Scientific career
Fields
Institutions
Thesis Recurrent Inhibition in the Giant Fibre System of the Crayfish and its Effect on the Excitability of the Escape Response (1967)
Doctoral advisor Ted Bullock

Alan Madoc Roberts, born in 1941, is a smart English scientist. He is an Emeritus Professor of Zoology at the University of Bristol. This means he is a retired professor who still keeps his title because of his important work. Zoology is the study of animals.

Alan Roberts' School Days

Learning About Animals

Alan Roberts went to Rugby School and then to the University of Cambridge in England. At Cambridge, he studied Natural Sciences, focusing on Zoology. He was a student at Trinity College, Cambridge.

Advanced Studies in the USA

Later, he traveled to the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) in the United States. In 1967, he earned his PhD degree there. A PhD is a very high university degree that shows someone is an expert in their field. His research was about how Crayfish react to danger, specifically their "escape response." His professor, Theodore Holmes Bullock, guided his studies.

Awards and Special Recognition

Becoming a Fellow of the Royal Society

In 2015, Alan Roberts was chosen to be a Fellow of the Royal Society (FRS). This is a very important honor for scientists in the United Kingdom. It means he is recognized as one of the best scientists in the country.

Why He Was Honored

The Royal Society explained why they chose him. They said Alan Roberts is a great scientist who studies how animals' bodies work, especially their brains and nerves. He also studies how animals behave.

He spent a lot of time studying the tiny brains of amphibian tadpoles. His work helped us understand how their spinal cord creates movements like swimming. He also showed how senses and signals from the brain control these movements.

Inspired by another scientist named George E. Coghill, Roberts worked with simple networks of nerve cells in young animals. His detailed studies helped us understand how these connections develop and what they do.

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