Biographical Memoirs Volume 62 (1993) / Chapter Skim
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Pages 351-361
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KENNETH DAVID ROEDER March 9, 1908-September 28, 1979 BY V
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352 BIOGRAPHICAL MEMOIRS collection of British butterflies and moths. This zoological bent followed him to Cambridge' where he was trained in classical zoology.
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aIreacly clescribed spontaneous electrical activity in the isolated nerve cords of caterpillars, and Prosser was finding the same phenomenon in isolated crayfish ganglia. The consensus of vertebrate physiologists of the time was that ongoing activity was just physiological "noise." In reflecting on these matters, Roe(ler sensed some connection between continuous sexual and locomotor activity in his operated mantids and the spontaneous electrical activity observed by Adrian and Prosser.
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Carmichael found that his presidential obligations almost precluded research with the result that I practically had the set-up to myself. I went to work on the isolated nerve cords of various arthropods, studying (without much logic, I feel)
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Although early electrophysiological experiments on the central nerve cord were interesting to Roeder, none seemed to him to have obvious relevance to animal behavior until he react the 1950 essays of Conrad Lorenz and Erik van Holst. As he remarkoct, these seemed much more heuristic and acceptable to a zoologist than the then current PavIovian rat psychology.
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At meetings in Freiburg and Seewiesen he not only enriched his own unclerstancling of animal behavior but also influenced greatly by his quiet wisdom anct intellectual honesty the course of neuroethology.
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KENNETH DAVID ROEDER 357 In the 1960s Roecler turner! his attention to afference and the central control of acoustic evasive behavior of moths.
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The monumental body of work that led Roeder from mantis and cockroach behavior, to spontaneous activity in central nervous systems, to central inhibition, to neurophysiological analyses of prey-predator relationships, and finally to central processing of ultrasonic sounds was conductecl uninterruptedly over a period of forty-two years in a cramped, cluttered laboratory in the basement of Tufts College's Barnum Museum, the home of the Biology Department and of Barnum's stuffed elephant Jumbo. In this ecological niche between the years 1933 and 1945 he worked alone with practically no research funds beyond those proviclecl by the department plus a small grant from the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.
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KENNETH DAVID ROEDER 359 vivre, an excitement, a unique camaraderie. Ken was always available to discuss, challenge, and offer opinions.
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The first established him as the foun(ling father of insect physiology in America; the second presented a synthesis of his own physiological work and his broader views about the control of animal behavior. In 1975 he wrote: Today's apprentice scientist is confronted by such a flood of objective literature that he is apt to lose sight of the fact that this public outpouring is the work of very human and fallible creatures like himself.
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From page 361... ...
KENNETH DAVID ROEDER 361 influenced by human bias, insight, blindness and imagination as well as by chance. When he is reporting research the scientist rightly attempts to discount these imponderables in fact, he does all that he can to limit their influences on his conclusions.
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