Mikhail Rimskii-Korsakov

Born Aug. 20 (Sept. 1), 1873, in St. Petersburg; died Mar. 11, 1951, in Leningrad. Soviet zoologist and entomologist. Honored Scientist of the RSFSR (1945).

Rimskii-Korsakov, the son of the composer N. A. Rimsky-Korsakov, was graduated from the University of St. Petersburg in 1895. He became a professor at the Forestry Institute in 1921 (now the Leningrad Academy of Timber Technology). Rimskii-Korsakov studied principally the morphology, anatomy, embryology, taxonomy, and biology of arthropods—particularly such insects as web spinners, caddis flies, book lice and their allies, and ichneumon flies. His best-known research was in forest entomology. Rimskii-Korsakov directed and assisted in the compilation of the textbook Forest Entomology (1935; 3rd ed., 1949), the manual Zoological Excursions (parts 1-2, 1924–28; 6th ed., 1956, with B. E. Raikov), Identification Handbook of Lesions of Forest and Ornamental Trees and Shrubs of the European Section of the USSR (1934; 3rd ed., 1951, with V. I. Gusev), and other books. He was awarded two Orders of Lenin.