Igerna Brünhilda Johnson Sollas (1877–1965), also known as Hilda Sollas, was a British

zoologist Zoology ( , ) is the scientific study of animals. Its studies include the structure, embryology, classification, habits, and distribution of all animals, both living and extinct, and how they interact with their ecosystems. Zoology is one ...

palaeontologist Paleontology, also spelled as palaeontology or palæontology, is the scientific study of the life of the past, mainly but not exclusively through the study of fossils. Paleontologists use fossils as a means to classify organisms, measure geolo ...

and

geologist A geologist is a scientist who studies the structure, composition, and History of Earth, history of Earth. Geologists incorporate techniques from physics, chemistry, biology, mathematics, and geography to perform research in the Field research, ...

, and lecturer at

Newnham College, Cambridge Newnham College is a women's constituent college of the University of Cambridge. The college was founded in 1871 by a group organising Lectures for Ladies, members of which included philosopher Henry Sidgwick and suffragist campaigner Millicen ...

. She was one of the first women to be taught geology at the

University of Cambridge The University of Cambridge is a Public university, public collegiate university, collegiate research university in Cambridge, England. Founded in 1209, the University of Cambridge is the List of oldest universities in continuous operation, wo ...

. She had wide interests, studying marine organisms, genetics, and palaeontology, and collaborated with Cambridge geneticist

William Bateson William Bateson (8 August 1861 – 8 February 1926) was an English biologist who was the first person to use the term genetics to describe the study of heredity, and the chief populariser of the ideas of Gregor Mendel following their rediscover ...

. An alumna of

Alexandra College Alexandra College () is an independent day and boarding school for girls in Milltown, Dublin, Ireland. The school operates under a Church of Ireland ethos. History The school was founded in 1866 and takes its name from Princess Alexandra of ...

, Dublin, she was recognized as a role model for women in higher education in Ireland and England.

Early life and education

Igerna Sollas was born on 16 March 1877 in

Dawlish Dawlish is a seaside resort town and civil parishes in England, civil parish in the Teignbridge district in Devon, England. It is located on the south coast of England at a distance of from the city of Exeter and a similar distance from the to ...

Devon Devon ( ; historically also known as Devonshire , ) is a ceremonial county in South West England. It is bordered by the Bristol Channel to the north, Somerset and Dorset to the east, the English Channel to the south, and Cornwall to the west ...

, the daughter of geologist

William Johnson Sollas William Johnson Sollas (30 May 1849 – 20 October 1936) was a British geologist and anthropologist. After studying at the City of London School, the Royal College of Chemistry and the Royal School of Mines he matriculated to St. John's Colleg ...

and his first wife Helen. She received an early education at Alexandra School and College in Dublin, and then attended

on a Gilchrist scholarship in 1897, where she took

first class honours The British undergraduate degree classification system is a grading structure used for undergraduate degrees or bachelor's degrees and integrated master's degrees in the United Kingdom. The system has been applied, sometimes with significant var ...

in both part I and part II of the

Natural Sciences Tripos The Natural Sciences Tripos is the framework within which most of the science at the University of Cambridge is taught. The tripos includes a wide range of Natural Sciences from physics, astronomy, and geoscience, to chemistry and biology, whi ...

exam, completing a zoology degree in 1901. She held the position of lecturer in zoology at Newnham from 1903 to 1913, save for the period 1904 to 1906 when she was a Newnham college research fellow.

Career

Her research included a huge range of animals, both modern and fossil. These included earthworms,

sponge Sponges or sea sponges are primarily marine invertebrates of the animal phylum Porifera (; meaning 'pore bearer'), a basal clade and a sister taxon of the diploblasts. They are sessile filter feeders that are bound to the seabed, and a ...

s and

sea squirts Ascidiacea, commonly known as the ascidians or sea squirts, is a paraphyletic class in the subphylum Tunicata of sac-like marine invertebrate filter feeders. Ascidians are characterized by a tough outer test or "tunic" made of the polysaccharid ...

, fish, mammal-ancestors and mammals. She is also known for methods of separating minerals for chemical analysis, and for work using serial grinding. She led research on fossils in collaboration with her father, and they were the first people to use the serial sectioning device he invented to look at the structure of a

dicynodont Dicynodontia is an extinct clade of anomodonts, an extinct type of non-mammalian therapsid. Dicynodonts were herbivores that typically bore a pair of tusks, hence their name, which means 'two dog tooth'. Members of the group possessed a horny, t ...

skull. At Cambridge she was part of an active research group led by

, and she studied the genetics of colouration in

guinea pig The guinea pig or domestic guinea pig (''Cavia porcellus''), also known as the cavy or domestic cavy ( ), is a species of rodent belonging to the genus ''Cavia'', family Caviidae. Animal fancy, Breeders tend to use the name "cavy" for the ani ...

s and moth wings.

Later life

Later in life she became a practitioner of

Christian Science Christian Science is a set of beliefs and practices which are associated with members of the Church of Christ, Scientist. Adherents are commonly known as Christian Scientists or students of Christian Science, and the church is sometimes in ...

and contributed articles to Christian Science journals. In moving to Christian Science she gave up her work on animal genetics and biology. She passed her research on to biologist and writer,

Naomi Mitchison Naomi Mary Margaret Mitchison, Baroness Mitchison (; 1 November 1897 – 11 January 1999) was a List of Scottish novelists, Scottish novelist and poet. Often called a doyenne of Scottish literature, she wrote more than 90 books of historical an ...

and her brother, biologist J. B. S Haldane. Her scientific publications ceased after 1916, and she took up gardening and care of her father's house after his death in 1936.

Death and legacy

Sollas died in November 1965, aged 88. She is commemorated in the name '' Igernella'', a genus of sponges named by zoologist

Émile Topsent Émile-Eugène-Aldric Topsent (10 February 1862 – 22 September 1951) was a French zoologist known for his research of sponges. He was born in Le Havre. During his career he worked in several laboratories and institutes in western France. Fro ...

in 1905, and by the

echinoderm An echinoderm () is any animal of the phylum Echinodermata (), which includes starfish, brittle stars, sea urchins, sand dollars and sea cucumbers, as well as the sessile sea lilies or "stone lilies". While bilaterally symmetrical as ...

'' Euthemon igerna''.Sollas, WJ. 1899. Fossils in the University Museum, Oxford: I. On the Silurian Echinoidea and Ophiuroidea. ''Quarterly Journal of the Geological Society of London'', 692-715.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Sollas, Igerna 1877 births 1965 deaths 20th-century British zoologists 20th-century British women scientists British geneticists English zoologists British women geneticists British women zoologists English geologists English palaeontologists Alumni of Newnham College, Cambridge People from Dawlish People educated at Alexandra College