Professor Peter Doherty (b. 1940), immunologist, shared the Nobel Prize for Medicine in 1996 for his discoveries about how the immune system recognises virus-infected cells. At the John Curtin School of Medical Research from 1973 to 1975, Doherty and his Nobel co-recipient Rolf Zinkernagel investigated components of the immune system known as 'killer T-cells', paving the way for a better understanding of organ rejection after transplants and genetic susceptibility to disease. Doherty has said that his success as a scientist stems from 'a non-conformist upbringing, a sense of being something of an outsider, and looking for different perceptions in everything from novels, to art, to experimental results. I like complexity, and am delighted by the unexpected.' Since 1988 he has been head of the immunology department at St Jude Children's Research Hospital, Tennessee.

For information on:

• the Nobel Prize in Physiology/ Medicine 1996;
• an illustrated presentation on "the specificity of the cell mediated immune defense";
• Peter Doherty's autobiography;

hit: www.nobel.se/medicine/laureates/1996/

Photo by Peter Doherty

Rick Amor is a Victorian-based painter, printmaker and sculptor. After studying in Melbourne and winning many prizes and grants, from 1975 to 1983 he produced a series of cartoons attacking the Fraser government, receiving valuable support from union members during a period of severe financial difficulty. After 1983 he began to paint more personal and emotionally charged works, often incorporating a haunting 'solitary watcher'. Some of his paintings of suburban and inner Melbourne now number amongst the defining images of the city. During the 1990s Amor was awarded several art residencies and worked in Barcelona, New York and London. In 1999, as Australia's first official war artist since Vietnam, he travelled to East Timor to document the devastated land and the reconstruction efforts of peacekeepers. The resulting works are in the collection of the Australian War Memorial. Amor is a highly regarded portrait painter and a regular exhibitor in the Archibald Prize. He is represented in most major Australian galleries.

Photo by Rick Amor

"My characteristics as a scientist stem from a non-conformist upbringing, a sense of being something of an outsider, and looking for different perceptions in everything from novels, to art to experimental results. I like complexity, and am delighted by the unexpected. Ideas interest me. I was influenced early on by reading Arthur Koestler and Edward de Bono, and more recently by the writings of Karl Popper and Thomas Kuhn. My research career has been highly unconventional, and I have not been a full-time student in the academic sense since I was 22 years old. I have never had a powerful mentor who saw me as the product (or continuation) of his program, a situation that probably helped to determine the outcome of my two attempts to return to Australia. Intellectually, I march to the beat of my own drum and have little interest in competing in "races". There are too few people working in the area of viral pathogenesis and immunity, too little funding, too many problems and too little time."

- Peter Doherty