astronomy

Mercedes Delfinado

Mercedes Delfinado is a astronomy topic covered in the lgStudy science library. This page brings together a partial reference excerpt, illustrations, worked examples, real-world applications and a short study plan, so you can understand Mercedes Delfinado rather than just read about it. In short: Mercedes D. Delfinado (born 16 January 1933) is a Filipino acarologist.

Key takeaways

Mercedes Delfinado belongs to astronomy; place it in that map before memorising details.
Learn the definition first, then one example that makes the definition concrete.
Connect Mercedes Delfinado to a quantity you can measure, compute or draw — that is where exam questions come from.
Reproduce the core statement of Mercedes Delfinado from memory before moving on to harder problems.

Reference excerpt

Mercedes D. Delfinado (born 16 January 1933) is a Filipino acarologist. She is a specialist in bee mites, and published widely on insects of south-east Asia. For over twenty years, she was a Chief Editor for the International Journal of Acarology. Multiple species were named in her honour. In 1962, Delfinado was a recipient of a Guggenheim Fellowship.

Biography Delfinado was born in Cabuyao, Laguna on 16 January 1933. She graduated with a Master of Science degree in entomology from Cornell University in 1960. She was awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship in 1962 for her work on organisimic biology and ecology. In 1966, she graduated from the University of Hawaiʻi with a PhD in acarology. While there, she co-prepared a catalogue of Philippine Diptera. She married Edward W. Baker, also an acarologist, with whom she worked at the United States Department of Agriculture's (USDA) Systematic Entomology Laboratory in Beltsville, building the collection there, and in 1999 expanding the premises to accommodate more researchers. While at the USDA, Delfinado specialised in the study of bees at the Beneficial Insects Laboratory. This included the identification of the honey bee mite Acarapsis woodi and she was the first to report the presence of Melittiphis alvearius in the United States. Heavily involved with the International Journal of Acarology, she was a Chief Editor for over twenty years until her retirement in 1999. She and her husband retired to the Philippines, and she established a research fellowship on mite taxonomy in his honour.

Eponymous species

Ker mercedesae Culex (Lophoceraomyia) uniformis ssp. mercedesae Culicoides delfinadoae Tipula (Sinotipula) delfinadoae Tarsonemus mercedesae

Selected publications Smiley, Robert L., W. Baker Edward, and Mercedes Delfinado Baker. "New species of Hypoaspis (Acari: Mesostigmata: Laelapidae) from the nest of a stingless bee in Malaysia (Hymenoptera: Meliponinae, Apidae)." Anales del Instituto de Biología serie Zoología 67.002 (1996). Delfinado-Baker, Mercedes, and Christine YS Peng. "Varroa jacobsoni and Tropilaelaps clareae: A perspective of life history and why Asian bee-mites preferred European honey bees." American bee journal (USA) (1995). Delfinado, Mercedes D., and Edward W. Baker. "Varroidae, a new family of mites on honey bees (Mesostigmata: Acarina)." Journal of the Washington Academy of Sciences (1974): 4–10. Delfinado, Mercedes O. "New species of shore flies from Hong Kong and Taiwan (Diptera: Canaceidae)." Oriental Insects 5.1 (1971): 117–123. Mercedes D. Delfinado, Notes on Philippine Black Flies (Diptera : Simuliidae), Journal of Medical Entomology, Volume 6, Issue 2, 1 May 1969, Pages 199–207 Delfinado, Mercedes D. "Mites of the honeybee in South-East Asia." Journal of Apicultural Research 2.2 (1963): 113–114.

References

Worked examples

Example 1 — a first encounter with Mercedes Delfinado

Start with the simplest possible case. Write down what Mercedes Delfinado claims or describes in one sentence, then invent the smallest concrete situation in which that sentence is true. In astronomy, the smallest case is usually a single object, a single equation or a single measurement. Check that every symbol or term in your sentence has a meaning in that case.

Example 2 — changing one variable

Take the situation from Example 1 and change exactly one quantity: double it, halve it, or set it to zero. Predict what should happen to Mercedes Delfinado before you calculate. Comparing your prediction with the result is the fastest way to find out whether you understand the idea or only the words.

Example 3 — an exam-style question

Typical questions about Mercedes Delfinado ask you to (a) state it precisely, (b) apply it to given data, and (c) explain a limitation. Practise writing all three answers in under five minutes; the third part is what separates a full-mark answer from an average one.

Applications of Mercedes Delfinado

In research: Mercedes Delfinado appears in astronomy research whenever the underlying quantities have to be modelled precisely. Papers usually cite it as a starting assumption and then explore where it breaks down.
In technology and industry: Engineering practice reuses Mercedes Delfinado in design rules, simulations and safety margins. Knowing the idea lets you read a specification sheet and understand why the numbers look the way they do.
In the classroom: Mercedes Delfinado is common in secondary-school and first-year university syllabi. It links to neighbouring topics 1933 births, Acarologists, Cornell University alumni, so understanding it makes those chapters shorter.
In everyday life: Look for Mercedes Delfinado outside the textbook — in sport, cooking, traffic, electronics or the sky above you. An example you found yourself is remembered far longer than one you were given.

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How to study Mercedes Delfinado in 20 minutes

Read the reference excerpt below once, without taking notes.
Close the page and write down what Mercedes Delfinado means in your own words.
Compare your version with the excerpt and mark what you missed.
Work through the three examples above with pen and paper.
Explain Mercedes Delfinado out loud to somebody else — or to Teacher Smith in the lgStudy chat.

Frequently asked questions

What is Mercedes Delfinado in simple terms?

Mercedes D. Delfinado (born 16 January 1933) is a Filipino acarologist.

Why does Mercedes Delfinado matter?

Because it connects several astronomy ideas at once: it gives you a definition you can apply, a quantity you can calculate, and a way to check whether a result is plausible.

How should I study Mercedes Delfinado?

Read the excerpt, restate it from memory, then work through the examples and applications listed on this page. The five-step study plan above takes about twenty minutes.

What does this page cover?

It gives you a compact reference excerpt plus original lgStudy explanations, examples, applications and study material on Mercedes Delfinado.