MSc Witwatersrand (South Africa) 1947; DPhil Oxford 1950, BM 1952.
Allison worked in medical research in Oxford in the 1950s. In 1957 he was appointed at the Medical Research Council's National Institute for Medical Research. In 1967 he became head of the cell pathology division at the Clinical Research Centre. In 1972 he was appointed Procter professor of experimental pathology at University of Manchester.