On Wednesday March 10th, Sir Philip Cohen, the Director of the MRC Protein Phosphorylation Unit and the Scottish Institute for Cell Signaling, will give the MRC Basic Science Lecture at the Annual Meeting of the American Society of Toxicology, Salt Lake City, Utah, USA. Sponsored since 1995 by the MRC Toxicology Unit, which is based at the University of Leicester, England, the aim of the lecture is to showcase research being carried out by UK scientists who have an involvement with the UK Medical Research Council. Previous speakers have included the Nobel Laureates Sir John Walker and Robert Horvitz. Established by Lewis Smith, when he was the Director of the MRC Toxicology Unit, the lectureship covers the speaker's travel and accommodation and provides an honorarium of US$10,000. Sir Philip will also be made an Honorary Member of the American Society for Toxicology at the opening session of the meeting on the evening of Sunday March 6th.