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OBITUARY NOTICE 



Dr CAEOLINE burling THOMPSON. 



1869-1921. 



Dr Caroline Burling Thompson, Professor of Zoology at Wellesley 

 College, Mass., U.S.A., died on December 5, 1921. Prof. Thompson was 

 noted not only for the excellence and thoroughness of her original methods 

 of teaching, but also for her original research work in biology. She was an 

 inspiration to her students and also found means of helping them in many 

 practical ways, unknown to any but herself. 



Miss Thompson did original research work in biology in connection 

 with the marine laboratories both at Naples, Italy, and Woods Hole, 

 Mass. Her most noted work was on the biology of termites — the most 

 destructive of the social insects. She has been a Collaborator of the 

 Branch of Forest Entomology, Bureau of Entomology, U.S. Department 

 of Agriculture, since March 1917. 



1916 saw Miss Thompson's first paper on termites. It was an original 

 piece of research on the brain and frontal gland of a common termite of 

 eastern United States. She discovered that there was very Uttle differen- 

 tiation between the brains of the different castes of this termite and none 

 between the sexes, the most marked difference being in the optic ap- 

 paratus. Miss Thompson suggests that the frontal gland may have arisen 

 phylogenetically from the ancestral median ocellus now lacking. This 

 work was of considerable importance, since the frontal gland is of great 

 taxonomic value. 



In 1917, a paper on the origin of the castes of a common termite 

 revolutionised the attitude taken by students of termites. Hitherto the 

 attitude had been almost entirely anthropocentric; Dr Thompson dis- 

 proved that the "complementary"' or "substitute" queens or repro- 

 ductive forms of termites could be manufactured through feeding by 

 workers. She definitely proved that the origin of all castes is due to 

 intrinsic causes. Thus, by careful scientific study, much of the mystery 

 of the " complex "' social system of the termites — which has led to admira- 

 tion by man of these insects — has been proven a myth. Facts now sup- 

 plant the older fantastic theories, so dear to writers of the eighteenth 

 and nineteenth centuries ! 



Ann. Biol, ix 6 



