Michael Eugene Nicolas Majerus (13 February 1954 – 27 January 2009) was a British geneticist and professor of evolution at the University of Cambridge.
He was an enthusiast in Darwin's theory of evolution by natural selection and became a world authority in his field of insect evolutionary biology.
His father, a Luxembourg national by origin, encouraged him by taking him for field trips on weekends and bringing him home specimens from his travels.
He was educated at Merchant Taylors' School, Northwood, and graduated in botany and zoology from Royal Holloway College, London.
He earned his PhD from Royal Holloway College on the study of the genetic control of larval colour in the angle shades moth.
[27] The publication of Melanism: Evolution in Action in 1998 in which Majerus analysed and defended Kettlewell's experiments provoked severe criticism.
Kettlewell's works were seen as lacking proper experimental procedure, with some even accusing it variously as a fake, fraudulent, hoax and wrong.
[28][29][30][31] The accusations were most influentially popularised by Judith Hooper in her 2002 book Of Moths and Men (which in turn received severe criticisms).
[36][37] Majerus's works clearly vindicated the experiments on peppered moth evolution, and the paper concluded that: The new data, coupled with the weight of previously existing data convincingly show that 'industrial melanism in the peppered moth is still one of the clearest and most easily understood examples of Darwinian evolution in action'.Majerus was the president of the Amateur Entomologists' Society,[38] a Fellow of the Royal Entomological Society, and a Life Fellow of the British Naturalists' Association.