Roger Ainsworth obituary

My friend Roger Ainsworth, who has died aged 67 of cancer, was a distinguished engineer who worked first at Rolls-Royce and then for the Atomic Energy Research Establishment (AERE), before in 2002 becoming master of St Catherine's College, Oxford.

Roger was born in Morecambe, Lancashire, to Harold Ainsworth, a civil servant, and his wife, Mary (nee Reynolds). After Lancaster Royal grammar school he completed an apprenticeship with Rolls-Royce and then went to Jesus College, Oxford, where he won a first-class degree in engineering in 1973 and then a doctorate in 1976.