Frej Ossiannilsson

Main building of Uppsala University

Frej Ossiannilsson (born December 8, 1908 in Helsingborg , † March 6, 1995 in Uppsala ) was a Swedish zoologist and professor at Uppsala University . He discovered the previously unknown sound production at cicadas (Auchenorrhyncha: Cicadomorpha and Fulgoromorpha ) not the family named after this ability leafhoppers belong by squeezing a tube containing enclosed therein animals to his ear. The result is his in the field of bio-acoustics of insects groundbreaking work "Insect drummers" from the year 1949th

family

Frej Ossiannilsson was the firstborn of five sons of the writer Karl Gustav Ossiannilsson (1875-1970) and his wife Naemi, née Arnman. The family moved to Linghem in Östergötland in 1915 . The parents taught their children themselves and took all of them to the school leaving certificate . In 1938 Frej Ossiannilsson married Inegärd Malmström, whom he met while studying at Lund University . Their only daughter was named Maj after a poem by her grandfather. In 1940 the family moved to Stockholm , where Frej Ossiannilsson worked at the Institute for Plant Protection. The family moved there to teach at the Faculty of Agriculture at Uppsala University. The zoologist died there in 1995 after a stroke .

Career

After completing military service, Frej Ossiannilsson studied chemistry , zoology , botany and education at Lund University . In 1934 he published his first article on Swedish cicadas. He graduated in 1935. The Second World War forced him to do military service again. The family's economic situation was poor, but his entomological expertise made it possible to earn additional income through experiments on the chemical control of ticks , fleas and lice . He used his own body for this by attaching small cages with test animals to his arms and legs with rubber bands . Later, as assistant to Professor Kemner, he was responsible for the maintenance and organization of the insect collection of the Swedish Institute for Plant Protection. In 1940 he was permanently employed and moved with his family to Stockholm. He was responsible for the inventory of the insect fauna of potato fields and other field crops. Furthermore, he was particularly interested in the Schnabelkerfen (Hemiptera). During this time he was able to expand his taxonomic and ecological knowledge considerably and wrote a richly illustrated treatment of the cicada fauna of Sweden in the series "Svensk Insektfauna" (1946/47), which was the forerunner of his later widely known three-volume book.

Frej Ossiannilsson finally discovered the generation of sound in so-called "non-singing cicadas" by pressing a tube with animals enclosed in it to his ear. Until then, sound generation was only known in the family of singing cicadas (Cicadidae), as it was clearly audible by humans. He subjected this to a more detailed examination and was able to determine that the apodemes on which the singing muscles attach can be used to determine the species. His 1949 dissertation at Lund University “Insect drummers” was groundbreaking work in the field of insect bioacoustics . In the same year he was hired as a lecturer at the Faculty of Agriculture at Uppsala University and was made a full professor in 1963 in recognition of his taxonomic work.

Most of his time in Uppsala was devoted to the taxonomy of aphids and cicadas. He wrote "The Auchenorrhyncha of Fennoscandia and Denmark" in the series "Fauna Entomologica Scandinavia". The processing contains detailed images of the genital morphology as well as the apodemes of the cicadas. His last work was the treatise of the leaf fleas (Psylloidea) within the same series in 1992. The manuscript was proofread by his successor Jan Pettersson.

He and his wife spent many summers in different regions of Sweden to collect insects. After his retirement in 1974 he left an insect collection with around 20,000 preserved individuals.

Since 1984 Frej Ossiannilsson has held an Honorary Fellowship for his pioneering work in the field of acoustic communication of the cicadas at the Royal Entomological Society in London .

The chants of some of the cicadas examined by Frej Ossiannilsson in his dissertation were put on a record that is still played on various occasions by the Swedish radio . In 2002, on the occasion of the 11th International Auchenorrhyncha Congress in Potsdam, a digital reproduction was made on CD . You can hear the singing of the alder foam cicada ( Aphrophora alni ).

Interests

His greatest interest was in his work. But literature and music were also part of his leisure time activities. After his death, his library contained around 4,000 books in English, German, French, Latin and Greek. In his family he played the violin and spent an hour each day listening to music, with Mozart being his preferred composer . He was also interested in theater and art .

Works

• Contributions to the knowledge of Swedish Cicadina. II., With description of a new species . Opusc. ent. 9, 1944, pp. 14-16.
• Halvvingar. Hemiptera. Stritar Homoptera Auchenorrhyncha . Svensk insectfauna 7, 1946, pp. 1-150.
• Halvvingar. Hemiptera. Stritar Homoptera Auchenorrhyncha . Svensk insectfauna 7, 1947, pp. 151-270.
• Insect drummers. A study on the morphology and function of the sound-producing organ of Swedish Homoptera Auchenorrhyncha . Opusc. entomol., Suppl. 10, 1949, pp. 1-146.
• On the identity of Cicada spumaria Linnaeus (1758) (Hem. Hom.) With notes on the breeding-plants of three Swedish Cercopids . Opusc. ent. 15, 1950, pp. 145-156.
• On the shape of the apodemes of the second abdominal sternum of the males as a specific character in the genus Macrosteles Fieb. (Hom. Auchenorrhyncha) . Opusc. ent. 16, 1951, pp. 109-111.
• The Auchenorrhyncha (Homoptera) of Fennoscandia and Denmark. Part 1: Introduction, infraorder Fulgoromorpha . Scandinavian Science Press, Copenhagen 1978.
• The Auchenorrhyncha (Homoptera) of Fennoscandia and Denmark. Part 2: The Families Cicadidae, Cercopidae, Membracidae, and Cicadellidae (excl. Deltocephalinae) . Scandinavian Science Press, Copenhagen 1981.
• The Auchenorrhyncha (Homoptera) of Fennoscandia and Denmark. Part 3: The Family Cicadellidae: Deltocephalinae, Catalog, Literature and Index . Scandinavian Science Press, Copenhagen 1983.
• The Psylloidea (Homoptera) of Fennoscandia and Denmark . Fauna Entomologica Scandinavica 26, 1992.

literature

• Maj Sundblatt, Jan Pettersson: In memoriam Frej Ossiannilsson. In: Werner E. Holzinger, Ingrid Kammerlander, Herbert Nickel: The Auchenorrhyncha of Central Europe - Die Zikaden Mitteleuropas. Volume 1: Fulgoromorpha, Cicadomorpha excl. Cicadellidae . Brill, Leiden 2003, ISBN 90-04-12895-6 , p. 3 f.
• Rainer Emmrich: History of the cicada in Central Europe . In: Werner E. Holzinger, Ingrid Kammerlander & Herbert Nickel: The Auchenorrhyncha of Central Europe - Die Zikaden Mitteleuropas. Volume 1: Fulgoromorpha, Cicadomorpha excl. Cicadellidae . Brill, Leiden 2003, ISBN 90-04-12895-6 , pp. 19-25.

Web links

• photo
• Tymbal - The Auchenorrhyncha Website