Auguste Henri André Duméril (30 November 1812 – 12 November 1870) was a French zoologist. His father, André Marie Constant Duméril (1774–1860), was also a zoologist. In 1869 he was elected as a member of the Académie des sciences. Duméril studied at the University of Paris, and in 1844 became an associate professor of comparative physiology at the university. From 1857, he was a professor of

herpetology Herpetology (from Ancient Greek ἑρπετόν ''herpetón'', meaning "reptile" or "creeping animal") is a branch of zoology concerned with the study of amphibians (including frogs, salamanders, and caecilians (Gymnophiona)) and reptiles (in ...

and ichthyology at the Muséum National d'Histoire Naturelle in Paris. In 1851, with his father, he published ''Catalogue méthodique de la collection des Reptiles''. With zoologist Marie Firmin Bocourt (1819–1904), he collaborated on a project called ''Mission scientifique au Mexique et dans l'Amérique Centrale'', a publication that was the result of Bocourt's scientific expedition to

Mexico Mexico, officially the United Mexican States, is a country in North America. It is the northernmost country in Latin America, and borders the United States to the north, and Guatemala and Belize to the southeast; while having maritime boundar ...

and Central America from 1864 to 1866. The section on reptiles is considered to be Dumeril's best written effort in the field of

. Duméril died in 1870 during the siege of Paris, and ''Mission scientifique au Mexique et dans l'Amérique Centrale'' was continued by Bocourt, Léon Vaillant (1834–1914) and other scientists. As part of the ''Collection des Suites à Buffon'', he issued a two-volume ichthyological study titled '' Histoire naturelle des poissons, ou Ichtyologie générale'' (1865, 1870), research that complemented the works of Georges Cuvier (1769–1832) and Achille Valenciennes (1794–1865) by describing species not covered by the two famous naturalists. Duméril also conducted significant research involving the axolotl (''Ambystoma mexicanum'').Herpetological Osteopathology: Annotated Bibliography of Amphibians and Reptiles
by Hans-Peter Schultze, Rodrigo Pellegrini

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'' Saurogobio dumerili'' Bleeker 1871 was named in honor of Duméril, who invited Bleeker to examine Chinese cyprinids in the Muséum national d’Histoire naturelle’s collection.

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{{DEFAULTSORT:Dumeril, Auguste 1812 births 1870 deaths 19th-century French zoologists French ichthyologists French herpetologists Members of the French Academy of Sciences Burials at Père Lachaise Cemetery National Museum of Natural History (France) people Scientists from Paris University of Paris alumni

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References