URFs become FRS

Three of the new Fellows elected to The Royal Society in 1999 had previously held Royal Society University Research Fellowships (RSURFs). They were not, in fact, the first Fellows of the Society to have held RSURFs, for Richard Borcherds was elected in 1994 and Jean Beggs in 1998, but the election of three in the same year is sufficiently notable to be recorded in Notes and Records as a journal of record for the Society. The RSURF scheme continues to achieve its aim of affording opportunities to outstanding young scientists to continue research careers in circumstances of everincreasing constriction in university departments. It would naturally be expected that some of the RSURFs would eventually be elected to the Society, and the election of three in one year, relatively soon after the inception of the scheme, demonstrates that the aims of the scheme are indeed being achieved, and that it, and the Fellows, are becoming mature and established. To mark such a milestone in the history of the scheme and the Society, we print below reflections on their experiences as RSURFs and subsequently, by the three Fellows elected in 1999.