Society of Biology (renamed in 2015 the "Royal Society of Biology"), Peberdy was elected a Fellow, served on its council during the 1980s, and chaired its East Midlands Branch. He also served on the council of the Society for General Microbiology (renamed in 2015 the "Microbiology Society"). In the 1990s he was one of the founders of a small biotechnology company, as well as a national UK biotechnology competition in which UK university students compete by proposing ideas for biotechnology start-ups. This competition called "Biotechnology Young Entrepreneurs Scheme (Biotechnology YES)" became very successful. For his services to student entrepreneurship, Peberdy was made in 2000 MBE. He helped to initiate annual summer lab walks to help group bonding and to show the plants and fungi of the Derbyshire Peak District to overseas students. He was the president of the British Mycological Society for one year from 1984 to 1985. As president, he attended the society's spring and autumn forays and surprised the field mycologists with his extensive field knowledge of fungi and plants. In 1964 in Basford, Nottinghamshire, John F. Peberdy married Jennifer "Jennie" A. Fry. Upon his death in 2020 he was survived by his widow and their daughter Caroline. Eponyms Trichoderma peberdyi Selected publications Articles Books (pbk reprint of 1980 1st edition) (pbk reprint of 1994 1st edition) References 1937 births 2020 deaths 20th-century British botanists 21st-century British botanists English microbiologists British mycologists Alumni of Newcastle University Alumni of the University of Nottingham Academics of the University of Nottingham Fellows of the Royal Society of Biology Members of the Order of the British Empire Presidents of the British Mycological Society