Frank Harold Rigler | The Canadian Encyclopedia

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Frank Harold Rigler

Frank Harold Rigler, biologist (b at London, Eng 9 June 1928; d at Montréal 26 June 1982). Educated at U of T, in 1957 he returned from postdoctoral study in England to the zoology department there.

Rigler, Frank Harold

Frank Harold Rigler, biologist (b at London, Eng 9 June 1928; d at Montréal 26 June 1982). Educated at U of T, in 1957 he returned from postdoctoral study in England to the zoology department there. A world authority in aquatic biology, Rigler directed an important Canadian contribution to the International Biological Program, a study of Char Lk in the High Arctic. In 1976 he moved to McGill's biology dept as chairman and professor. Rigler believed that good science required sound philosophy and taught its importance to a generation of students. He was alarmed by environmental degradation, and his advocacy of a more applicable ecology crystallized a long tradition in Canadian freshwater research that stresses practical theory based on observation rather than precepts; his later work on eutrophication control is an example. In his honour the Society of Canadian Limnologists instituted the F.H. Rigler Memorial Lectures in 1984.