Vocation : Travel : Explorer

Gustaaf Adolf Frederik Molengraaff (27 February 1860 – 26 March 1942) was a Dutch geologist, biologist and explorer. He became an authority on the geology of South Africa and the Dutch East Indies.
Gustaaf Molengraaff studied mathematics and physics at Leiden University. From 1882 he studied at Utrecht University. As a student he made his first journey overseas when he joined the 1884–1885 expedition to the Dutch Antilles led by Willem Frederik Reinier Suringar and Karl Martin. He became PhD with a thesis on the geology of Sint Eustatius. He studied crystallography in Munich, where he also took the opportunity to study the geology of the Alps nearby.
In 1888 Molengraaff took a job as a teacher at the University of Amsterdam. Before his assignment courses in geology were given by the chemist Jacobus Henricus van 't Hoff. During his assignment in Amsterdam, Molengraaff travelled to South Africa to study gold deposits (1891) and to Borneo (1894) where he explored large parts of the inland. Teaching at Amsterdam was not to his liking, because there were too little materials and students available.
In 1897 Molengraaff became "state geologist" of the Transvaal Republic. His task was to start the geological survey of the Transvaal. While mapping the Transvaal he discovered the Bushveld complex. In 1900 he got involved in the Second Boer War and had to return to the Netherlands. This gave him time to write a report on the geology of the Transvaal, and travel to Celebes, where he (again) studied gold deposits.
Due to his reputation as a geologist he could return to South Africa in 1901 to work as a geological consultant. One of his assignments was to describe the newly found Cullinan diamond for the Central Bank of South Africa. Meanwhile the Boer War still had his attention. One of his ideas was to give each soldier a small tin identity card, which later became practice in armies around the world.
In 1906 he became professor at Delft University and this time he got enough resources and students to make his work successful. The same year he became member of the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences. In 1910-1911 he led a geological expedition to Timor. His research at Delft was mainly on the material collected during that expedition, and on the geology of the Netherlands. In 1922 he was a guide, along with A L Hall, of the Shaler Memorial Expedition to South Africa, organized by Harvard University. On the expedition he met Alexander Du Toit, both geologists were among the (at that time rare) supporters of Alfred Wegeners' continental drift theory.
Molengraaff was a close friend of W. F. Gisolf, who named his youngest son after him but died in a Japanese concentration camp.
Molengraaff retired in 1930.

Félix Joseph Henri de Lacaze-Duthiers (15 May 1821 – 21 July 1901) was a French biologist, anatomist and zoologist born in Montpezat in the department of Lot-et-Garonne. He was a leading authority in the field of malacology.He studied medicine in Paris, and worked at Necker Hospital under Armand Trousseau (1801–1867). Later on, with Jules Haime (1824–1856), he travelled to the Balearic Islands to study marine life. In 1854 he returned to Paris as an assistant to Henri Milne-Edwards (1800–1885), and soon afterwards became a professor of zoology in Lille.
In 1865 he succeeded Achille Valenciennes (1794–1865) as chair of histoire naturelle des mollusques, des vers et des zoophytes at the National Museum of Natural History, France, and in 1868 became a professor at the University of Paris. In 1871 he was elected to French Academy of Sciences in the department of anatomy and zoology.

Lacaze-Duthiers is remembered for his study of the anatomy and developmental history of mussels, coral, snails, brachiopods and other invertebrate marine animals. In 1858 he discovered three mollusks in the Mediterranean that produced purple-blue dyes. One of the species, named murex trunculus, was the source of the distinctive purple-blue dye used by the ancient Phoenicians and Canaanites. He realised the dying process could be used to create a photographic image in purple-blue dye which he named the Mucographé process. Examples are preserved in the Sorbonne and the Royal Society in London.
He conducted pioneer exploration of marine life of coastal Algeria, that included scientific studies of coral. A result of this research was the publication of "Histoire naturelle du corail" (1864).He was the founder of two laboratories devoted to marine biology; the biological station at Roscoff in 1876, and the Arago laboratory at Banyuls-sur-Mer in 1882. A number of species bear his name, a few of them being: Strophomenia lacazei, Convoluta lacazi and Dileptus lacazei. In 1872 he founded the journal "Archives de zoologie expérimentale et générale" (Archives of Experimental and General Zoology).

Alfred Grandidier (20 December 1836 – 13 September 1921) was a French naturalist and explorer.
From a very wealthy family, at the age of 20, he and his brother, Ernest Grandidier (1833–1912), undertook a voyage around the world. At first they were led by the astronomer and physicist Pierre Jules César Janssen (1824–1907), but when Janssen fell sick and had to return to France after about six months, the brothers continued the journey.
They visited South America in 1858 and 1859 and in particular the Andes, Peru, Chile, Bolivia, Argentina and Brazil. During this voyage they gathered a significant collection of specimens which were analyzed, in 1860, by Ernest.
The two brothers parted ways after this. Ernest Grandidier went to China and collected a vast number of specimens which are now in the Louvre and the Guimet museum. Alfred travelled to India, reaching it in 1863. He had intended to explore the high plateau of Tibet, but was prevented by a severe attack of fever.
Grandidier travelled to Zanzibar to recuperate, remaining some time and making important collections and publishing an account of his findings. He then visited the island of Réunion and in 1865 made his first visit to Madagascar. He became devoted to the study of the island, revisiting in 1866 and 1868. He finally returned permanently to France in 1870. During his explorations he crossed the island three times, travelling 3000 kilometers in the interior and 2500 along the coast. He made observations which resulted in the production of a map of the island used in future expeditions.

After returning to France he began to work on his great work, L'Histoire physique, naturelle et politique de Madagascar. This work was undertaken in cooperation with others such as Alphonse Milne-Edwards and Leon Vaillant. This work ran to 40 volumes, the final volumes published posthumously by his son Guillaume Grandidier. He described about 50 new species of reptiles and amphibians.Alfred Grandidier's work drew the attention of the French government to Madagascar, which it would annex at the end of 1890.
He was elected to the French Academy of Sciences in 1885 and was the president of the French Geographical Society from 1901 to 1905. The Royal Geographical Society awarded him their Founder's Medal in 1906.

Robert William Schmieder (born July 10, 1941) is an American scientist and explorer. Schmieder has had a multidisciplinary career, broadly divided between physics and related physical sciences, and natural science and exploration. In most of his projects, he created and led teams of both professional scientists and volunteers. His work is documented in about 100 technical publications and 10 books. Among his most significant work was the invention of laser spark spectroscopy (now commercialized), the formulation of nanologic (the use of nanoscale devices in computers), and the concept of underwater islands (which led to designation of the Cordell Bank National Marine Sanctuary).

Louis-Marie-François Tardy de Montravel, often Louis Tardy de Montravel (28 September 1811, in Vincennes – 4 October 1864, in Elbeuf) was a French admiral, explorer and colonial administrator. He served as the second commandant of New Caledonia from 1 January 1854 to 31 October 1854.

Eugène Abdon Mage (30 July 1837 – 19 December 1869) was a French naval officer and explorer of Africa. Mage published the first detailed description of the Toucouleur Empire created by El Hadj Umar Tall.