Alan Eddy obituary

My father, Alan Eddy, who has died aged 90, was the founding professor of biochemistry at Umist - the University of Manchester Institute of Science and Technology - where he carried out groundbreaking work with yeast. He was appointed professor and head of the department of biochemistry in 1959, and was in the vanguard of Umist's transformation into a leading university.

Born in St Just, Cornwall, Alan was the son of Ellen (nee Berryman) and Alfred Eddy. His mother was a teacher; his father worked as an assayer (working out how much metal there was in rocks) in the local tin mines and later, after qualifying as an accountant, as a salesman for the Burroughs Adding Machine company. Alan showed early academic promise, winning a scholarship to Devonport high school and then an open scholarship to Exeter College, Oxford, to study chemistry. At Oxford he rowed for the college and, as a member of the athletics club, trained with Roger Bannister.