Professor Mary Myerscough is internationally recognised for her expertise in the application, modelling, and analysis of non-linear dynamical systems, with the goal to gain a deep conceptual understanding of the qualitative and quantitative dynamics of biological systems. Throughout her career, Mary has sought to produce new mathematical models with impact and practical importance in the life sciences, securely founded in experimental and observational truth. Her commitment to mentoring and career development, combined with her exemplary scientific insight, has opened up new systems-based ways of thinking about scientific problems. It has allowed her and her team of collaborators and students to gain a fundamental understanding of extremely complex, high-dimensional systems.

Particularly significant is her ground-breaking research on the population dynamics of honey-bee colonies. Mary developed a modelling framework through which she could explain, in combination with empirical studies, how individual stress responses of honey bees interact with social dynamics to cause colony failure. This research had an immediate and direct impact when it was used by the EU as part of its case for banning neonicotinoid pesticides. Mary’s observation that ‘fools rush in where angels fear to tread’ is a characteristically modest turn of phrase, which fails to mention that it takes bravery and innate talent to tackle and make progress in a hard area that had been overlooked for modelling, like atherosclerosis. Her award-winning research contributes to a deeper understanding of the fundamental biological mechanisms behind the progression of atherosclerosis. She was able to quantify processes that are essential to atherosclerotic plaque growth, and estimate a physiological set of parameters that provides well-founded predictions of the development of early atherosclerotic plaques.