Bruno Hofer (15 December 1861 – 7 July 1916) was a German fishery scientist, credited with being the founder of fish pathology.

Career

Hofer was born in

Rhein Rhein may refer to: Places * Rhine, a major river in Europe (german: Rhein, link=no) * Rhein, a village in the municipality of Morsbach in North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany * Rhein (Ostpreussen), a former name of the town Ryn in Poland Ships * ...

in East Prussia (now Poland) in 1861. He studied

natural sciences Natural science is one of the branches of science concerned with the description, understanding and prediction of natural phenomena, based on empirical evidence from observation and experimentation. Mechanisms such as peer review and repeatab ...

at the

University of Königsberg The University of Königsberg (german: Albertus-Universität Königsberg) was the university of Königsberg in East Prussia. It was founded in 1544 as the world's second Protestant academy (after the University of Marburg) by Duke Albert of Pruss ...

, receiving his doctorate in 1887 in

Munich Munich ( ; german: München ; bar, Minga ) is the capital and most populous city of the German state of Bavaria. With a population of 1,558,395 inhabitants as of 31 July 2020, it is the third-largest city in Germany, after Berlin and Ha ...

as a student of

Richard Hertwig Richard Wilhelm Karl Theodor Ritter von Hertwig (23 September 1850 in Friedberg, Hesse – 3 October 1937 in Schlederloh, Bavaria), also Richard Hertwig or Richard von Hertwig, was a German zoologist and professor of 50 years, notable as the fir ...

. He then worked as an assistant at the Zoological Institute of Munich, and in 1889 obtained his habilitation.Hofer, Bruno
In: Neue Deutsche Biographie (NDB). Band 9, Duncker & Humblot, Berlin 1972, , S. 379 f. He obtained a position at the Zoological Institute as a university lecturer and in 1891 acquired citizenship of the

Kingdom of Bavaria The Kingdom of Bavaria (german: Königreich Bayern; ; spelled ''Baiern'' until 1825) was a German state that succeeded the former Electorate of Bavaria in 1805 and continued to exist until 1918. With the unification of Germany into the German ...

. In 1894 he was appointed as a curator of the ''Zoologischen Sammlung des Staates'', and two years later became a lecturer for ichthyology at the veterinary university of Munich. In 1898 he was awarded an associate professorship for

zoology Zoology ()The pronunciation of zoology as is usually regarded as nonstandard, though it is not uncommon. is the branch of biology that studies the animal kingdom, including the structure, embryology, evolution, classification, habits, and ...

and ichthyology and the chair of a full professor in 1904. During his career, he was also director of the "Royal Bavarian Research Station for Fisheries" and the "Royal Bavarian Research Station for Fish-Farming", vice-president of the "Bavarian Association of Fishermen" and editor of the magazine "''Allgemeine Fischereizeitung''". In 1909 he circumscribed the whitefish species '' Coregonus bavaricus''. Hofer died in 1916 in Munich at the age of 54.

Publications

Hofer was particularly active in the field of fish parasitology and pathology, and wrote the comprehensive German text on the subject, ''Fischkrankheitslehre'' (fish pathology), as well as his "''Handbuch der Fischkrankheiten''" (1904), "''Die Süßwasserfische von Mitteleuropas''" (1908), "''Über die Krebspest''" (1898), and more than 200 publications. In 1896 he was the author of a limnologic study of Lake Constance, titled "''Die Verbreitung der Thierwelt im Bodensee''" (The spread of wildlife in Lake Constance). One of his most significant publications was the taxonomic description of the

myxosporea Myxosporea is a class of microscopic parasites, belonging to the Myxozoa clade within Cnidaria. They have a complex life cycle which comprises vegetative forms in two hosts, an aquatic invertebrate (generally an annelid but sometimes a bryozoa ...

n parasite, ''

Myxobolus cerebralis ''Myxobolus cerebralis'' is a myxosporean parasite of salmonids (salmon and trout species) that causes whirling disease in farmed salmon and trout and also in wild fish populations. It was first described in rainbow trout in Germany in 1893, ...

''.Bruno Hofer
On the Whirling Disease in Rainbow Trout
Hofer is also known for his early work in environmental protection, in particular for the preservation of water quality and drinking-water resources.

References

*Götz, Sabine (1998): "Bruno Hofer (1861–1916), a life for fisheries and environmental protection." Munich, Univ. of Munich, 268p.

External links

*

about Hofer {{DEFAULTSORT:Hofer, Bruno 1861 births 1916 deaths German parasitologists Fisheries scientists Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich faculty University of Königsberg alumni People from the Province of Prussia People from Ryn German curators German ichthyologists 19th-century German zoologists