Alex Fain
Alexandre Marie Alphonse Jean "Alex" Fain (born August 9, 1912 in Mechelen ; died January 4, 2009 in Brussels ) was a Belgian tropical medicine specialist , acarologist and parasitologist .
Youth and Studies
Alex Fain grew up in a family of French, Flemish and German origins in Brussels. After attending a Catholic school in Brussels, he began studying medicine at the Université catholique de Louvain in 1932 . He graduated in 1938 and went to the Belgian Congo as a doctor .
Belgian Congo
During his 18 years in the Belgian Congo, Fain was initially director of a clinic and worked as a doctor. He later became director of the medical laboratory for the Belgian Congo and Rwanda. As a passionate hunter, he made it a habit to check his hunting trophies for parasites. This gave him access to parasitic worms and arthropods , especially mites . During his time in the Belgian Congo, Fain began to build up an extensive collection of parasitic mites, which he later handed over to the Royal Belgian Institute of Natural Sciences . Today it is one of the most important collections of its kind.
Research and Teaching
When Fain returned to Belgium in 1957, he was already a world-famous acarologist. He began teaching parasitology at the Institute for Tropical Medicine at the University of Antwerp and at the Université catholique de Louvain . There were also guest lectures in acarology at several universities in France, Great Britain and Switzerland.
His research focus was the parasitic mites of mammals. When the danger of allergy-causing house dust mites was recognized, he created a system of these mites that made the research work of allergists much easier.
Fain described more than 2,580 taxa , mostly parasites, including 2,407 mites , but also helminths , and insects . He wrote more than 1160 publications alone or together with colleagues. Fain's enormous workload, with up to five initial descriptions daily, led experts to the false assumption that he had a perfectly equipped laboratory and a large staff of employees. In fact, in addition to his work in his institute, Fain was required to give lectures, continued to work as a general practitioner, and devoted much time and attention to his wife and three children. He received little public funding for his research and his most important instrument was a rather old microscope. At times he paid professional illustrators out of his own pocket to prepare monographs. He repeatedly used his annual leave to recover mites from the alcohol-preserved mammals in the collections of the Natural History Museum in London. On the mediation of his American friend and colleague Edward Baker , Fain received funding for research into grave mites and visited museums in the United States several times.
In 1982 Fain retired from teaching. He began to volunteer at the Royal Belgian Institute of Natural Sciences in Brussels, where an office and other resources were made available to him. This started Fain's most productive phase, he worked four to five hours a day in the institute until 2006, and again several hours in the evening at home.
Fain was a member of numerous scientific societies in Belgium and abroad that deal with acarology or parasitology. He was an advisor to the World Health Organization .
Honors and dedication names (selection)
- Knight of the Order of Lions (1947)
- Médaille de l'effort de guerre colonial 1940-1945 (1948)
- Medal of Merit in Gold of the African Star Order (1956)
- Grand Officer of the Order of the Crown (1976)
- Grand Officer of the Order of Leopold II (1982)
Numerous invertebrate taxa have been named after Alex Fain , including the following:
- Fainia Zumpt , 1973
- Anopheles faini Leleup , 1952
- Araeopsylla faini Beaucournu , 1981
- Chauliopleona faini Larsen , 2005
- Mansa faini Benoit , 1954
- Rickia fainii Balazuc , 1990
Publications (selection)
- Helminthology médicale. Institut de médecine tropicale Prince Léopold, Antwerp, 1972
- (with B. Guérin and BJ Hart) Acariens et allergies . Allerbio, Varennes en Argonne 1988
- Les tiques de Belgique. Institut Royal des Sciences Naturelles de Belgique, Brussels, 1990
literature
- André V. Bochkov et al .: In memoriam of Alexander Fain 1912-2009. In: Acarina 2009, Volume 17, No. 2, pp. 243–244, Online PDF , 1.2 MB.
- Georges Wauthy, André V. Bochkov and Sergey V. Mironov: Obituary. Professor Dr. Alex Fain (1912-2009). In: Acarologia 2009, Volume 49, No. 1–2, pp. 3–4, Online PDF , 620 kB.
Individual evidence
- ↑ a b c d e André V. Bochkov et al .: In memoriam of Alexander Fain 1912–2009, p. 243.
- ↑ a b Georges Wauthy, André V. Bochkov and Sergey V. Mironov: Obituary. Professor Dr. Alex Fain (1912-2009), p. 3.
- ↑ Alex Fain: List des nouveaux taxa décrits par le Dr. Alex Fain. Institut royal des Sciences naturelles de Belgique, Brussels undated, Online PDF , 309 kB.
- ↑ Alex Fain: List des travaux publiés par le Dr. Alex Fain 1939-2003. Institut royal des Sciences naturelles de Belgique, Brussels no year, online PDF , 837 kB.
- ↑ a b André V. Bochkov et al .: In memory of Alexander Fain 1912-2009, S. 244th
- ↑ a b c Georges Wauthy, André V. Bochkov and Sergey V. Mironov: Obituary. Professor Dr. Alex Fain (1912-2009), p. 4.
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Fain, Alex |
| ALTERNATIVE NAMES | Fain, Alexandre Marie Alphonse Jean (full name) |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | Belgian tropical medicine specialist, acarologist and parasitologist |
| DATE OF BIRTH | August 9, 1912 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | Mechelen |
| DATE OF DEATH | January 4, 2009 |
| Place of death | Brussels |