Trained as a biochemist at University College Cardiff, Mark Seymour obtained his PhD in comparative drug metabolism (in vitro/in vivo correlation) from the University of London in 1988. He then spent 12 years in the R&D Department at the Horseracing Forensic Laboratory, conducting in vivo metabolism studies on compounds potentially used for doping racehorses, and develoing analytical methods to detect their use. In 1999, he joined the Drug Metabolism Department at Covance, Harrogate, where he was involved in running regulatory pre-clinical and clinical A(D)ME studies.