“I guess most people don’t think about this very beautiful, coordinated cellular response to make antibodies…” Michelle Linterman’s passion for her subject is immediately obvious. Born and bred on the Kapiti Coast, Michelle is a globally-renowned immunologist at the Babraham Institute, a site for biomedical research centred around an old red-brick manor house in a rolling natural landscape just outside Cambridge. This picturesque English setting provides the research group she established ten years ago with cutting-edge laboratory facilities for testing responses to new vaccines. Early in the pandemic, Michelle’s ten-person team at the Babraham ran an important preclinical study of the Oxford AstraZeneca vaccine in aged mice, in order to test - faster than could be tested in ageing humans - how that vaccine would act in older bodies. 

The Linterman Group’s wider research programme centres on the “nuts and bolts” of how the immune system mounts a good response against vaccination, and why vaccines don’t always work as well for certain age groups. Michelle’s team tests the detailed cellular and molecular functioning of vaccines against a range of human diseases, such as malaria and influenza. 

“There are always ideas - some happen, some don’t. There are constant opportunities and it's about picking and choosing the ones that align,” Chantelle Nicholson says. The Kiwi restaurant owner and Michelin-starred chef, who recently appeared on the BBC’s Celebrity Masterchef, is seasoned in pushing her ideas forward to fruition. Chantelle, 42, has been developing a trailblazing career in high-end cuisine with her own personal flavour since she first arrived in London 18 years ago. 

A New Zealand-trained lawyer, Chantelle began her transformation into a star chef at the iconic Savoy Grill, working all hours. “One of the things I’m grateful for is that I was actually quite naive about what I was getting into, and I didn’t really have an opportunity to overthink it,” she says. Her early mentors included restaurateurs Gordon Ramsay, Josh Emett and Marcus Wareing, the latter of whom elevated her to become the driving force at acclaimed Covent Garden eatery Tredwells in 2016. As owner-operator, Chantelle became recognised for her seasonal approach to menus and empathic attention to the sustainable use of human, environmental and food resources. For this, Tredwells received in 2021 a Green Michelin Star, the renowned Guide’s new recognition of ethical and environmental sustainability.

“It’s just so hot!” Attempting to avoid a summer heatwave on her drive up to Birmingham, Katie Sadleir is bubbling with excitement. Just days before the opening of the Games, Katie, the CEO of the Commonwealth Games Federation, is busy reviewing Covid practices for late entry arrivals and preparatory workshops for para athletes, as well as overseeing the launch of the Commonwealth Pride House, and with the Commonwealth Sports Ministers’ conference. It is clear she is firmly invested in her organisation’s strapline ‘Sport is just the beginning’. 

“I mean, it's central and its core and it's our reason to be. But it's what happens as a result of those conversations in sport - the trade programmes, the huge legacy stuff… that whole series of significant stakeholder opportunities that wrap around making the most of the Games in terms of forging relationships beyond this period”, she says. For Katie, the true buzz of the Commonwealth multi-sport environment lies in what this “multicultural hothouse… does to actually grow people”.