When Waddington was appointed by the Agricultural Research Council to the position of chief geneticist at National Animal Breeding and Genetics Research Organisation (NABGRO) in 1946, he also took up the University's Buchanan Chair in Animal Genetics. His relationship with the University became formalised in 1951, when a 'genetics section' separated itself from NABGRO (by then known as ABRO) and became what was known as the ARC Unit of Animal Genetics, of which Waddington was Director. This Unit was under the jurisdiction of the ARC, still housed within the Institute of Animal Genetics, although by this time Waddington was fully an employee of the University. Waddington played a large role in the expansion of the biological faculty of the University of Edinburgh, including the appointment of Michael Swann as professor of zoology and the creation of a department of molecular biology.