As Mike Dexter prepares to leave his post in London as director of the Wellcome Trust next week, all eyes are on what he will do next.
Dr Dexter, 57, who turned down a two-year extension to his contract, spent most of his 35-year research career at the Paterson Institute for Cancer Research - interrupted only by study at the universities of Salford and Manchester - and his present post. The father of four has not said what he plans to do next, but chances are he will be based in Macclesfield. Throughout his time in London he went home at the weekends.
Meanwhile, headhunters were last week appointed to help fill the post of head of the merged University of Manchester and the University of Manchester Institute of Science and Technology.