Sir Michael Rutter is Professor of Developmental Psychopathology at the Institute of Psychiatry, Kings College, London where he established the Medical Research Council Child Psychiatry Research Unit in 1984 and the Social, Genetic and Developmental Psychiatry Research Centre a decade later. His research has included the genetics of autism, antisocial behaviour, maternal deprivation, effects of institutional care on social development, and study of both school and family influences on children’s behaviour. He also has a special interest in the interplay between genetic and psychosocial risk factors. Rutter was Deputy Chairman of the Wellcome Trust from 1999 to 2004 and was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society in 1987. He was a Founding Fellow of the Academia Europaea and is Clinical Vice President of the Academy of Medical Sciences.