Jean-Jacques Kieffer (1857-1925)

Jean Jacques Kieffer

Jean-Jacques Kieffer (1857 Guinkirchen–1925 Bitche) was a French naturalist and entomologist who specialised in in the study of parasitic insects.Educated as a priest, Kieffer taught natural science in Bitche, Lorraine while working on the description and classification of insects. His work and publications later became a predominant source of description and classification for entomologists in the early 20th century, in particular with regard to parasitoid wasps, midges and mosquitos.

In 1887, he described "Aulax hypochoeidis Kieffer " first among hundreds of insects, previously unknown and which now bear his name. His work earned him in 1904 the title of Doctor Honoris Causa from the University of Strasbourg. In 1919, he was elected president of the Lorraine Society of Natural History. At the request of the Pasteur Institute in 1922 and 1923, Jean-Jacques Kieffer traveled to Algeria to study the disease-carrying mosquitoes. Research of this great scientist have contributed to develop biological control against insect pests using their own parasites.

Kieffer's church did not allow him to keep a collection, so many specimens were discarded after description. Extant collections of Hymenoptera are known in MNHN. Keiffer bequeathed the remainder of his collection (in a bad state of preservation) to H. Nomine. Some types are in BMNH, others in HNHM.

Jean-Jacques Kieffer died in Bitche, in December 1925.

from: http://gap.entclub.org/taxonomists/Kieffler/index.html and http://www4.ac-nancy-metz.fr/clg-jj-kieffer-bitche/SPIP/spip.php?article12 (accessed February 2014)