Alan Bell grew up on a dairy farm in South Gippsland, Victoria and was educated at the University of New England (B Rur Sc, Hons, 1969) and the University of Glasgow (PhD, 1976). He has held research and teaching positions at the CSIRO Division of Animal Physiology, Prospect, NSW; the Hannah Research Institute, Ayr, Scotland; La Trobe University, Bundoora, Victoria; Cornell University, Ithaca, New York, USA; and CSIRO Livestock Industries, St Lucia, Queensland. At Cornell he was Professor and Chairman of the Department of Animal Science from 1997 to 2007, with major responsibilities for teaching, research and extension in livestock biology and management. From 2007 until his retirement in 2012 he was Chief of CSIRO Livestock Industries with responsibility for research operations in Queensland, NSW, Victoria and Western Australia. In 2009 he was seconded for a year to help create and lead the new CSIRO Division of Food & Nutritional Sciences, returning to Livestock Industries in early 2010. Alan is internationally known for his research on the nutritional physiology of pregnancy, lactation and growth in sheep and dairy cattle, and has published more than 150 peer-reviewed original papers and reviews with a total of over 14,000 citations and an h-index of 60 (Google Scholar).