Alan Ruscoe Clarke was educated at Haileybury College and Guy's Hospital, where he won the Michael Harris anatomy prize, the Wooldridge physiology prize and the general proficiency prize in 1928, and graduated MB BS in 1931. He held resident appointments at Guy's Hospital and clinical assistantships

Born 15 March 1906 at Rangoon, Burma, the eldest child of Mr Vedamanickam, accountant in the Burma railways. He was educated at St Antony's Boys High School and the University, Rangoon. After postgraduate study in England, he was appointed resident surgeon, lecturer in anatomy, and tutor in clinical

Trained at the North Middlesex Hospital during 1930-32 as a general surgeon, he also practised neurosurgery and cardiac surgery. He became a frequent visitor to European and Russian clinics, attending surgical conferences, and was one of the early visitors to Moscow, when brain operations were carri