science

Rolande Roux-Estève

Rolande Roux-Estève is a science 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 Rolande Roux-Estève rather than just read about it. In short: Rolande Roux-Estève (10 October 1921 – 6 July 2009 in Levallois-Perret, Département Hauts-de-Seine) was a French herpetologist and ichthyologist. She began her career with the study of fish, but during her time in the Congo began studying African blind snakes (typhlopidae).

Key takeaways

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Reference excerpt

Rolande Roux-Estève (10 October 1921 – 6 July 2009 in Levallois-Perret, Département Hauts-de-Seine) was a French herpetologist and ichthyologist. She began her career with the study of fish, but during her time in the Congo began studying African blind snakes (typhlopidae).

Biography Roux-Estève was born in Toulouse on 10 October 1921; her father worked as a mathematician at the university there. Rolande graduated from the University of Toulouse with her bachelor's degree in mathematics in 1939. In November 1942, she took a position at the National Museum of Natural History, France in Paris. Roux-Estève was working mainly with fish, including those collected in the Red Sea during expeditions of the research vessel Calypso led by Jacques-Yves Cousteau. In 1952, she changed her name to Rolande Roux-Estève after marrying the biologist Charles Roux. They lived for a time in the Congo (now Republic of Congo).

Blind snakes

On her return to Paris and the museum, one of her significant tasks was the identification of the museum's many snake specimens. Roux-Estève's herpetological research comprised 22 titles published between 1962 and 1995, 15 of which dealt with African snakes. Her main interest was blind snakes, which she also made the subject of her doctoral thesis, Recherches sur la morphologie, la biogéographie et la phylogenie des Typhlopidae d'Afrique (Dr.sci.nat. at the Pierre and Marie Curie University in 1975). Her dissertation was published in two parts in 1975 and represents her most notable publication. One of these parts, a 313-page monograph on African blind snakes, required handling enormous quantitative datasets, which benefited from her early training in mathematics. Because the vast majority of these snake species are characterized by small body size, counting the scales on large samples became a demanding task, requiring a great deal of patience and diligence. Roux-Estève's writings covered a range of topics: identifications of collections belonging to French and Belgian nationals, careful taxonomic surveys of species or genera, guides to local snake faunas, studies of morphology, biogeography and phylogeny, and lists of specimens in the Paris Museum. She named new taxa, including Letheobia (formerly Rhinotyphlops) wittei (Roux-Estève, 1974) from Zaire, Madatyphlops (formerly Typhlops) domerguei (Roux-Estève, 1980) from Madagascar, the blind snake species Myriopholis (formerly Leptotyphlops) perreti (Roux-Estève, 1979) from Cameroon, the adder species Philothamnus hughesi Trape & Roux-Estève, 1990 from Cameroon, the Central African Republic, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, the Republic of the Congo, Gabon, South Sudan and Uganda, the African blind snake genus Rhinoleptus Orejas-Miranda, Roux-Estève & Guibé, 1970 and the skink species Melanoseps loveridgei Brygoo & Roux-Estève, 1982 from Tanzania, She was invited to join a select group of academics to help form a new professional association in 1979, the Society of European Herpetologists. She was a representative of France for the initial group.

Dedication names Several species were named after Roux-Estève in honor of her contributions to herpetology: The double creeper species Cynisca rouxae Hahn, 1979 The climbing frog species Anodonthyla rouxae Guibe 1974 The blind snake species Afrotyphlops rouxestevae Trape, 2019 The worm snake Myriopholis rouxestevae Trape & Mané, 2004

Selected publications Bertin, Léon and Rolande Roux-Estève. "Catalogue des types de poissons du Muséum National d'Histoire Naturelle." (1939). Roux-Estève, Rolande. Révision systématique des Typhlopidae d'Afrique Reptilia-Serpentes. Éditions du Muséum, 1974. Jean François, W. E., and Rolande Roux-Estève. "L Note sur une collection de serpents du Congo avec description d'une espèce nouvelle." Brygoo, E. R., and Rolande Roux-Esteve. "Un genre de lezards scincines d’Afrique: Melanoseps." Bull. Mus. Natn. Hist. Nat. Paris 4ème sér 3 (1981): 1169–1191. Trape, Jean-François, and Rolande Roux-Estève. "Les serpents du Congo: liste commentée et clé de détermination." Journal of African Zoology 109, no. 1 (1995): 31–50.

References

Illustrations

Worked examples

Example 1 — a first encounter with Rolande Roux-Estève

Start with the simplest possible case. Write down what Rolande Roux-Estève claims or describes in one sentence, then invent the smallest concrete situation in which that sentence is true. In science, 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 Rolande Roux-Estève 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 Rolande Roux-Estève 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 Rolande Roux-Estève

In research: Rolande Roux-Estève appears in science 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 Rolande Roux-Estève 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: Rolande Roux-Estève is common in secondary-school and first-year university syllabi. It links to neighbouring topics 1921 births, 2009 deaths, 20th-century French scientists, so understanding it makes those chapters shorter.
In everyday life: Look for Rolande Roux-Estève 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 Rolande Roux-Estève in 20 minutes

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Frequently asked questions

What is Rolande Roux-Estève in simple terms?

Why does Rolande Roux-Estève matter?

Because it connects several science 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 Rolande Roux-Estève?

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 Rolande Roux-Estève.