Career
From 1963 to 1966 he worked at European Organization of Nuclear Research, then from 1966 to 1974 on computer-aided design at Cambridge University, and from 1974 to 1991 at the Natural History Museum as curator of the British herbarium. In 1991, he became a Principal Scientific Officer at the Royal Botanic Garden Edinburgh. He published over fifty peer reviewed papers and sat on several committees:
Botanical Society of the British Isles: Committee for Scotland.
Database Committee
Botanical Society of Scotland: Council
Biodiversity Information Standards (TDWG): Descriptors Group (as convenor)
International Organisation for Plant Information: Information Systems Committee, Checklist Committee (co-convener)
His book Biological Identification (1978) has been described as " the first textbook on computer methods in identification".
Pankhurst died in 2013, a year after the species Taraxacum pankhurstianum, endemic to Saint Kilda, was named in his honour, for his suggestion that the seed from which it was grown at Edinburgh be collected.