Advice to a young researcher: with reminiscences of a life in science by J. Michael T. Thompson Philosophical Transactions A Volume 371(1993): June 28, 2013 ©2013 by The Royal Society

All a matter of balance. J. Michael T. Thompson Phil. Trans. R. Soc. A 2013;371: ©2013 by The Royal Society

(a) ‘Saint Jerome as Cardinal’ by Domenikos Theotokopoulos (1541–1614) reproduced courtesy of the National Gallery, London. J. Michael T. Thompson Phil. Trans. R. Soc. A 2013;371: ©2013 by The Royal Society

(a) An electroplated spherical shell made at Stanford by Nicolas Hoff and his team. J. Michael T. Thompson Phil. Trans. R. Soc. A 2013;371: ©2013 by The Royal Society

A letter from Rodney Hill, FRS, editor of the Journal of the Mechanics and Physics of Solids, in which he drew my attention to the work of Koiter. J. Michael T. Thompson Phil. Trans. R. Soc. A 2013;371: ©2013 by The Royal Society

The Hubble telescope which needed expensive in-flight repairs due to errors made in the grinding of its massive primary mirror. J. Michael T. Thompson Phil. Trans. R. Soc. A 2013;371: ©2013 by The Royal Society

Imperfection-sensitivity surfaces for the interactive buckling of a stiffened plate calculated and drawn by Giles Hunt. J. Michael T. Thompson Phil. Trans. R. Soc. A 2013;371: ©2013 by The Royal Society

An illustration from Thompson & Stewart's book [18] showing stroboscopic Poincaré sections of a periodically driven nonlinear oscillator, illustrating a steady-state sub-harmonic motion of order n=2. J. Michael T. Thompson Phil. Trans. R. Soc. A 2013;371: ©2013 by The Royal Society

A schematic three-dimensional sketch illustrating the structure of the tangled saddle-node bifurcation. J. Michael T. Thompson Phil. Trans. R. Soc. A 2013;371: ©2013 by The Royal Society

Enthusiastic A-level students launching rockets that they have designed and built during a one- week residential course at the Villiers Park centre in Foxton. J. Michael T. Thompson Phil. Trans. R. Soc. A 2013;371: ©2013 by The Royal Society

Detail from a photograph taken at the IUTAM Collapse symposium held in London in 1982, showing three participants at the reception held under the UCL dome. J. Michael T. Thompson Phil. Trans. R. Soc. A 2013;371: ©2013 by The Royal Society

The complex spatially chaotic load–deflection diagram for an infinitely long strut on a nonlinear elastic foundation. J. Michael T. Thompson Phil. Trans. R. Soc. A 2013;371: ©2013 by The Royal Society

Two advanced concepts of nonlinear dynamics whose discoveries allowed the formulation of the simple practical idea of transient capsize testing. J. Michael T. Thompson Phil. Trans. R. Soc. A 2013;371: ©2013 by The Royal Society

The notional histogram of a young researcher, Jane Smith, showing papers listed in order of decreasing number of citations (not chronologically). J. Michael T. Thompson Phil. Trans. R. Soc. A 2013;371: ©2013 by The Royal Society

Four plots of papers published and citations gained (both are cumulative) for the early careers of four scientists. J. Michael T. Thompson Phil. Trans. R. Soc. A 2013;371: ©2013 by The Royal Society