This meant that when I left school I had to work as a technician in a microbiological laboratory associated with the local Guinness brewery.
This progress in the molecular analysis of the cell cycle led to more interest being taken in my work and as a consequence to greater competition.
A key issue in developmental biology at that time was the problem of how cells underwent differentiation, with most workers concentrating on explanations in terms of changes in enzyme and gene regulation.
I decided that the University of Sussex in Brighton was a good place for this work because it had a strong tradition in bacterial molecular genetics and an excellent reputation in biology.