Robert Winston

In 1973, he went into the wedlock with Lira Helen Feigenbaum, popularly known as Lady Winston. The couple has been blessed with three children.

He founded the Reach Out Laboratory at the Imperial College to help promote the science literacy and education. What’s more, he gives around 20 to 30 lectures per year on scientific subjects.

He is an ardent fan of the Arsenal Football Club.

Robert Winston was the eldest of the three children born to Laurence and Ruth Winston-Fox in London. His mother served as a Mayor of the former Borough of Southgate.

Tragedy struck young Winston early when his father died due to medical negligence. He was merely nine years old then. It was due to this that he eventually took up medical studies.

He gained his preliminary education from St Paul’s School in London, post which he enrolled at The London Hospital Medical College. In 1964, he graduated from the college with a degree in medicine and surgery, achieving prominence as an expert in human fertility.

Post completing his studies, he briefly gave up on clinical medicine and instead started working as a theatre director. In 1969, he went on to win the National Director’s Award at the Edinburgh Festival.

Resuming medicine academically, he started developing tubal microsurgery and various techniques in reproductive surgery including sterilization reversal.

In 1970, he took up the position of a registrar at the Hammersmith Hospital and later became a Wellcome Research Fellow.

In 1975, he was appointed as an Assistant Professor at the Catholic University of Leuven, Belgium. For two years, from 1975 until 1977, he served as the scientific advisor to the World Health Organization’s programme in human reproduction.

In 1977, he joined as the Royal Postgraduate Medical School as a consultant and Reader. Later on, he conducted research as a Professor of Gynaecology at the University of Texas Health Science Center a San Antonio.

Over the years, he has received honorary doctorate degrees from as many as sixteen universities across the world.

He has been an honorary fellow of various institutions including the Academy of Medical Sciences, Royal Academy of Engineering, Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists, Royal College of Surgeons, Royal College of Physicians and Surgeons and the Institute of Biology

Furthermore, he is also the member of the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council where he chairs the Societal Issues Panel, and patron of The Liggins Institute, University of Auckland, New Zealand.

In his lifetime, he has received numerous medals, including the Cedric Carter Medal, Victor Bonney Medal, Michael Faraday Prize, Edwin Stevens Medal, Aventis Prize, Al-Hammadi Medal and so on.

In 1998, he became the gold medalist at the Royal Society of Health. The following year, he won the British Medical Association Gold Award for Medicine in the Media.