Mike was the first teacher I had who conveyed the excitement of his own research (he gave us tutorials in his lab at UCL, 1966-67). Mike, together with Andrew Huxley and Eric Denton, was interested in animal reflectors and when I came briefly back to this subject a few years ago, to set up a Wikipedia entry, I was struck again by his authoritative mastery of whatever he worked on. Two other memories are his disappointment that I was not able to keep up with his cossack dancing in the common room, and, many years later, the abundance of glow worms in his garden. Jonathan Coles