With the end of hostilities he entered Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge, as Ebden Scholar of the University of Cape Town, obtaining his Ph.D. in 1950. He later accepted a post with the South African Council for Scientific and Industrial Research as the Head of its Biophysics Sub-Division. In 1954 after 2½ years in Pretoria, Dr. Gerry Pickavance offered a job at Harwell in the Cyclotron Group.