THE backroom boys have been quietly plotting for almost a decade and finally, it appears, the stage for the revolution has been set. At last the ''Dundee phenomenon'' boasts a cachet way beyond the traditional tag of jute, jam, and Dennis the Menace, writes Alison Hardie.

Hundreds of the world's best brains and, significantly, some of the most prolific investors, are looking to the city - once memorably written off as ''this small town half way up Scotland'' by one who later converted to its cause - thanks to its burgeoning reputation as a centre of scientific excellence.

In a remarkable reversal of fortune, Dundee is no longer doomed to be Scotland's economic wasteland, but the Discovery City leading the battle to conquer cancer.

The roots of the transformation took hold in 1992 when, over a few pints in a city pub, Professor David Lane discussed the gene he had found years earlier that he was convinced he could manipulate to suppress cancers.

However, it would take months to obtain licences to experiment with p-53 on animals, so Professor Lane's friend and fellow biochemist Peter Hall offered himself as a human guinea pig.

The results of two skin biopsies were astounding. The data offered the first direct evidence that p-53 was a cancer ''brake'' gene - it suppressed the growth of tumours.

This remarkable discovery for the medical world has also since proved to have been the catalyst for the equally remarkable rebirth of Dundee.

The city's bullish ''Discovery'' branding is now enthusiastically embraced by both business and enterprise.

Mr Roland Wolf, who declined to move from Edinburgh to Dundee when he was first approached by Lane in 1989, is now a Dundee patriot.

Mr Wolf, who now heads a 90-strong team involved in the Dundee University cancer cracking network, says of the city: ''It's now coming to the point where people who are given the choice of Dundee or Cambridge are heading for Dundee.

''There are so many brilliant people here.''

In fact, some 750 biochemists, cell biologists, and developmental biologists are concentrated in laboratories at Dundee University devoted to finding a cure for cancer. It is a hothouse environment that has been developed thanks to the brilliance and inspiration of David Lane, who speaks with boundless energy about p-53 - what he calls ''my favourite gene''.

As a 19-year-old biochemistry student, he watched his own father die from bowel cancer.

''It had a profound effect on me,'' says Professor Lane, of Purley, Surrey.

''My mother, sister, three brothers, and I looked after him until the very end. I was just appalled that we could do absolutely nothing for him and I decided then that, if I could, I wanted to do something to stop this terrible illness.''

He first discovered p-53, one of many genes strung along the DNA double helix in the cell nucleus, when he was 26.

He is now a 45-year-old father of two and believes his discovery will be tested on human sufferers by the end of this year.

Earlier this year, shortly after being awarded the coveted Paul Ehrlich award for this work, he pronounced his aim of a cure for cancer was ''no longer a pipedream - we will make it a reality''.

Dundee's crowning glory is the university's ''sparkling citadel of science'', the #13m Wellcome Trust Building that was opened on May 1. It houses 250 scientists investigating the causes of diseases including rheumatoid arthritis, osteoporosis, skin diseases, and malaria.

The city's special pull and the growing reputation of its redbrick university is amply illustrated by the fact that the first donation to the Wellcome building was a #40,000 gift from Sean Connery.

Professor Lane and his team of 25 workers at the Cancer Research Campaign laboratories at Dundee University are now working on a radically new and kinder approach to cancer treatment. Professor Lane's team hope p-53 will spell an end to much of the gruelling radiotherapy, chemotherapy and surgery patients undergo.

If they are successful, their work will see him achieve his lifetime ambition to ''do something'' to stop the illness that killed his father. It would be an achievement many believe would win him a Nobel Prize.

Closer to home in Dundee, his work has brought economic hope to people.

And the secret of Dundee's success? Simple teamwork.

Professor Lane says: ''It's what we have become renowned for and it's something we have to keep building on to make Dundee exciting. The pride people feel here and the jobs technology is creating is really changing the image of the city.

''We have created a city people want to come to and an atmosphere they want to work in. We may not be the world capital of excellence yet, but we are a major player. What I always tell people is: watch this space.''