Samarendra Maulik
Samarendra Nath Maulik was an Indian entomologist who worked at the Natural [History Museum, London] and specialized in the systematics of the leaf beetles. He worked briefly at the University of Calcutta as a professor of Zoology. A structure on the hind femur, particularly of flea beetles, and used in their leaping motion has sometimes been called as "Maulik's organ".
Life and work
Maulik was born in Tamluk, West Bengal. He studied physics, chemistry and mathematics at St Xavier's College, Calcutta but later became interested in biology from 1902 and started working in Assam, experimenting on the breeding of insects, particularly those feeding on tea plants. He then spent some time at the Forest [Research Institute |Forest Research Institute] in Dehra Dun and at the Indian Museum under Nelson Annandale. He then went to live in Cambridge to study biology and then joined Imperial College to study entomology. After this he worked at the British Museum where he studied leaf beetles. He studied Chrysomelidae from around the world and described a very large number of taxa, nearly 56 genera and 300 species. He also worked on a few other groups outside of the Chrysomelidae including on the Neuroptera in collaboration with F. H. Gravely. A flea-beetle Maulika was named in his honour by Basu & Sengupta in 1980. He died of heart disease at his home in Chelsea at the age of 68.Maulik wrote on a wide range of topics, particularly in the Bangalore Mail and was known for his forceful but logical explication of ideas. Titles of his essays included 'Science and Art', 'Education', 'Mysticism in Man', 'Ecology of Literature', and 'Why Scandal-Mongering is a Social Institution'. He held liberal views and was an atheist. A dry-brush sketch of him made by the artist Malcolm Osborne was exhibited at the Spring Exhibition of Royal Academy in 1932.