Tribute to Professor F. James Rohlf

TRIBUTE TO PROFESSOR F. JAMES ROHLF -- (Extensions of Remarks - May 05, 2004)

SPEECH OF
HON. TIMOTHY H. BISHOP
OF NEW YORK
IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
WEDNESDAY, MAY 5, 2004

Mr. BISHOP of New York. Mr. Speaker, today I rise to honor Professor F. James Rohlf, for his outstanding career as a scientist and professor at Stony Brook University, who was elected a Fellow of the American Academy of the Arts and Sciences in 2001.

Professor Rohlf's current research is concerned with the development, evaluation, and application of new statistical methods for use in geometric morphometrics. Over the last few years he has written papers demonstrating how standard statistical methods such as principal components analysis, canonical variates analysis, multiple regression, and other methods can be adapted for the analysis of shape.

His work also emphasizes the development of interactive computer software to perform the unique computations needed in geometric morphometrics. This software also provides the special interactive graphical displays to enable users to visualize shapes and has made it possible for these new methods to be applied routinely by many biologists.
Due to the unfamiliarity of most biologists with the types of mathematics needed to understand the methods used in geometric morphometrics, many one to two week workshops have been held in cities and universities around the world, which Professor Rohlf has organized or in which he has been the principal lecturer. These programs are to teach the necessary techniques and to give potential users a chance to collect data, learn how to use the software, and to interpret the results.

Professor F. James Rohlf is also author and co-author of many publications. Early in his career he received fellowships from U.S. Public Health Service to conduct predoctoral research in 1959-1962, and a National Science Foundation postdoctoral appointment in 1962. He has received many honors including: W.J. Eckert Visiting Environmental Scientist; IBM T.J. Watson Research Center; Professor Visitant, Universidad Nacional del Litoral, Santa Fe, Argentina; Visiting Professor University of Rome "La Sapienza," Dipartimento di Biologia Animale e dell'Uomo; and the election to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.

Professor Rohlf held positions such as research assistant in 1958-59, teaching assistant in fall of 1959 and research associate in the summer of 1962 at the University of Kansas. He was visiting assistant professor of entomology in the spring of 1965 and associate professor of statistical biology, 1966-69. And, he was an assistant professor of biology at the University of California, Santa Barbara 1962-1966.

Professor F. James Rohlf is interested in and has been involved in the applications of mathematical methods and statistics (especially multivariate statistics) to problems in biology with emphasis on morphometrics and the theory of systematics. I am proud to recognize and honor Professor F. James Rohlf for his outstanding career as a scientist and professor and for all the many accomplishments and services he has provided to the community of biological science.