David Joseph Scourfield

ISO The International Organization for Standardization (ISO ; ; ) is an independent, non-governmental, international standard development organization composed of representatives from the national standards organizations of member countries. Me ...

FLS FRMS (October 20, 1866 – October 3, 1949) was a British civil servant and biologist known as an authority on the

Cladocera The Diplostraca or Cladocera, commonly known as water fleas, is a superorder (biology), superorder of small, mostly freshwater crustaceans, most of which feed on microscopic chunks of organic matter, though some forms are predatory. Over 1000 sp ...

. He served as president of the

Quekett Microscopical Club The Quekett Microscopical Club is a learned society for the promotion of microscopy. Its members come from all over the world, and include both amateur and professional microscopists. It is a registered charity and not-for-profit publisher, with t ...

and vice president of the

Royal Microscopical Society The Royal Microscopical Society (RMS) is a learned society for the promotion of microscopy. It was founded in 1839 as the Microscopical Society of London making it the oldest organisation of its kind in the world. In 1866, the Society gained it ...

. Born in

Bow, London Bow () is a district in East London, England and is in the London Borough of Tower Hamlets. It is an inner-city suburb located east of Charing Cross. Historic counties of England, Historically in Middlesex, it became part of the County of L ...

, he was hired by the

Royal Mint The Royal Mint is the United Kingdom's official maker of British coins. It is currently located in Llantrisant, Wales, where it moved in 1968. Operating under the legal name The Royal Mint Limited, it is a limited company that is wholly ow ...

at age 20 and worked there until his retirement in 1926, when he was awarded the

Imperial Service Order The Imperial Service Order was established by King Edward VII in August 1902. It was awarded on retirement to the administration and clerical staff of the Civil Service throughout the British Empire for long and meritorious service. Normally a pe ...

for his services. His scientific career primarily took place after retirement from civil service, publishing on fossil and living freshwater crustaceans. He died at his home in

Leytonstone Leytonstone ( ) is an area in East London, England, within the London Borough of Waltham Forest. It adjoins Wanstead to the north-east, Forest Gate to the south-east, Stratford to the south-west, Leyton to the west, and Walthamstow to the nor ...

at the age of 83. He has been honoured in the names of two types of marine taxa, in 1912, botanist

George Stephen West George Stephen West (20 April 1876 – 7 August 1919), ARCS, FLS, was a British botanist, a specialist in phycology and protistology, a botanical illustrator and a writer. With his father, botanist William West (West, 1848–1914), he colla ...

published ''

Scourfieldia ''Scourfieldia'' is a genus of green algae in the family Scourfieldiaceae. ''Cardiomonas'' Korshikov is an invalid synonym. The genus was circumscribed by George Stephen West in J. Bot. vol.50 on page 326 in 1912. The genus name of ''Scourfiel ...

'', which is a

genus Genus (; : genera ) is a taxonomic rank above species and below family (taxonomy), family as used in the biological classification of extant taxon, living and fossil organisms as well as Virus classification#ICTV classification, viruses. In bino ...

green algae The green algae (: green alga) are a group of chlorophyll-containing autotrophic eukaryotes consisting of the phylum Prasinodermophyta and its unnamed sister group that contains the Chlorophyta and Charophyta/ Streptophyta. The land plants ...

in the family

Scourfieldiaceae ''Scourfieldia'' is a genus of green algae in the family Scourfieldiaceae. ''Cardiomonas'' Korshikov is an invalid synonym. The genus was circumscription (taxonomy), circumscribed by George Stephen West in J. Bot. vol.50 on page 326 in 1912. T ...

. Then in 1975, I.Manton published '' Pseudoscourfieldia'' (in the Pycnococcaceae family).

References

1866 births 1949 deaths British carcinologists People from Bow, London Companions of the Imperial Service Order 20th-century British zoologists {{UK-zoologist-stub