François-Alphonse Forel

François-Alphonse Forel (French pronunciation: [fʁɑ̃swa alfɔ̃s fɔʁɛl]; 2 February 1841 – 7 August 1912) was a Swiss physician[1] and scientist who pioneered the study of lakes, and is thus considered the founder, and the Father of limnology.

But his real love was the lake;[6] his investigations of biology, chemistry, water circulation, and sedimentation, and most importantly their interactions, established the foundation of a new discipline.

He named his activity limnology in analogy with oceanography ("limnography" could have been confused with the limnograph, which measures water level in lakes).

[7] The volumes covered a range of topics including the definition of limnology, as well as the geographic settings, geology, climatology, hydrology and bathymetry of lake systems.

The Monograph then went on to describe lacustrine hydraulics, seiches, waves and currents, temperature stratification, optics, acoustics and chemistry.

[8] He discovered the phenomenon of density currents in lakes, and explained seiches, the rhythmic oscillations observed in enclosed waters.

In a totally different field, in cooperation with the Italian seismologist Michele Stefano de Rossi, he developed the Rossi–Forel scale to describe the intensity of an earthquake.