The race to replace Boris Johnson as Conservative leader and British prime minister is heating up, with six candidates still in the contest after the first round of voting.
Rishi Sunak
The UK's first Hindu finance minister, and Britain's richest MP, Rishi Sunak quit last week and declared he was standing three days later.
Mr Sunak, 42, launched his campaign on Tuesday, saying he would not "demonise" the outgoing Mr Johnson despite helping to trigger his demise.
Long seen as Mr Johnson's most likely successor, his prospects were dented earlier this year by questions over his private wealth and family's tax arrangements.
Mr Sunak earned millions in finance before politics, and his Indian wife Akshata Murty's father co-founded the IT giant Infosys.
His apparent reluctance to embrace the immediate tax cuts being promised by rivals could also harm his prospects.
But a recent poll of Conservative members who will eventually vote for their new leader put Rishi Sunak on top.
Penny Mordaunt
Penny Mordaunt, 49, the first woman to have been UK defence secretary and currently a trade minister, joined the contest in a video posted to social media on Sunday.
A strong Brexit supporter and key figure in the 2016 "Leave" campaign, she has been tipped as a potential unity candidate who could draw support from the Conservative party's warring factions, and is popular among grassroots members.
The former magician's assistant launched her campaign on Wednesday, promising a return to Conservative policies of "low tax, small state and personal responsibility" and a "relentless focus on cost-of-living issues".
Liz Truss
Foreign Secretary Liz Truss confirmed her widely expected leadership bid on Sunday.
The 46-year-old is popular among Conservative members for her outspokenness.
But that has also stoked questions about her judgement, for instance when in February she encouraged Britons to fight in Ukraine.
Critics say her leadership posturing has been too overt and question her principles, after she campaigned against Brexit in 2016 only to ally herself with the Tory right.
When she headed the Department for International Trade, some MPs dubbed it the "Department for Instagramming Truss" because of her prolific output on the social media site.
Tom Tugendhat
Prominent backbencher Tom Tugendhat, who chairs parliament's influential foreign affairs committee, was the first to launch his bid.
A former army officer who served in the Middle East, he is also a hawk on China and has been critical of the government's handling of the troop withdrawal from Afghanistan.
The 49-year-old committed to spending 3% of GDP on defence as he launched his campaign on Tuesday.
Suella Braverman
Attorney General and arch-Brexiteer Suella Braverman declared her campaign in media interviews last week, even before Mr Johnson announced his resignation.
The 42-year-old is popular within the party for her Euroscepticism and fierce attacks on "woke" politics.
She is one of 28 so-called "Spartan" Tory MPs, who refused to back ex-prime minister Theresa May's Brexit deal on all three occasions it was voted on in parliament.
Kemi Badenoch
Former equalities minister Kemi Badenoch, who resigned last week, has one of the lowest profiles of the current contenders but is polling well among the party's members.
Another trenchant critic of "identity politics", the 42-year-old is a strong defender of conservatism and received a boost with the endorsement of Tory heavyweight Michael Gove.
