Irfan U. Jan,^1,2,*,** Michael H. Stephenson<sup>3,***

1</sup>aDepartment of Geology, University of Leicester, University Road, Leicester LEI 7RH, United Kingdom
²bNational Centre of Excellence in Geology, University of Peshawar, Pakistan
³cBritish Geological Survey, Kingsley Dunham Centre, Keyworth, Nottingham NG12 5GG, United Kingdom

^*Corresponding author. Email: ij21@le.ac.uk
^**IRFAN U. JAN has BSc and MSc geology from the Department of Geology, University of Peshawar, Pakistan. Previously working with Geo-Services East (a French-based oil services company), Irfan is now a lecturer at the National Centre of Excellence in Geology, University of Peshawar. Pakistan. In 2007 Irfan was awarded the Higher Education Commission of Pakistan scholarship and is currently pursuing Ph.D. studies at the University of Leicester, jointly supervised by Professor Michael Stephenson and Dr Sarah Davies. Irfan has been awarded BGS-BUFI funds for analytical and field work during his Ph.D. and has gained professional society funds for his research from the Geological Society of London and the International Federation of Palynological Societies. His Ph.D. work involves recording the palynology and sedimentology of the terrestrial Carboniferous—Permian Gondwanan successions of Pakistan and correlation of the successions with the regional stratigraphy. Irfan is a member of the Geological Society of London, The Micropalaeontological Society (TMS) and the Commission Internationale de Microflore du Paléozoïque (CIMP).
^***MIKE STEPHENSON is Head of Science (Energy) at the British Geological Survey (BGS) in Nottingham, UK. His education has included a BSc in Geology at Imperial College, an MSc and Ph.D. in Palynology at the University of Sheffield and various postgraduate teaching qualifica- tions. Mike spent almost 10 years as a school teacher in a rural school in Botswana, southern Africa before returning to Britain to take up research. Mike's scientific work is concerned mainly with the Palaeozoic stratigraphy of Arabia and he has published many papers on the region as well as working extensively as a consultant to oil companies in the area. Mike is also involved in computing applications in stratigraphy and the palynostratigraphy, sedimentology and palaeoecology of Palaeozoic sequences from onshore and offshore northwest Europe, Australia and Africa. Mike is a member of the AASP and PESGB, was Secretary General of the Commission Internationale de Microflore du Paléozoique (CIMP) between 2002 and 2008, and is presently palaeopalynology Editor-in-Chief of the Review of Palaeobotany and Palynology. Mike holds honorary professorships at the University of Nottingham and the University of Leicester.