4
Since Art didn’t want to spend 17 years in graduate school, he switched his dissertation topic to a comparative study of hearing between Mexican blind cavefi sh
and their sighted sister taxa (now considered subspecies of Astyanax mexicanus ),
demonstrating that both groups had similar ear morphology and hearing capabilities
(Popper 1970 , 1971 ; see Fig. 1 ). After graduation in 1969, Art moved to the
University of Hawaii as an assistant professor, where, in December 1971, he met a
new postdoc working with Nobel Prize winner Georg von Békésy. That postdoc—
Dr. Richard Fay—was just as fascinated with fi sh hearing as Art, and their chance
meeting at a barbeque has resulted in 25 papers (see essay by Popper in this volume), over 50 SHAR volumes (Springer Handbook of Auditory Research), and the
growth of our fi eld in fi sh bioacoustics. The fi rst Popper and Fay paper was published in 1973 with the title “Sound detection and processing by fi sh: a critical
review.” I suspect this early review was more of a strategic planning move, giving
them an excuse to review the literature so they could chart a course for the fi eld over
the next 40+ years.
After launching his independent career in Hawaii, Art moved back to the east
coast for a position at Georgetown University, then to the University of Maryland,
where he retired as Professor Emeritus in 2013. Through his long career Art has
slowly shifted his research focus from fundamental questions in comparative sensory biology to applied issues about the effects of underwater sound on fi shes and
other aquatic life. Much of Art’s early work focused on comparative morphology
between ears of fi shes from different taxonomic groups, using scanning electron
microscopy to describe variation in hair bundle morphology and bundle orientation
both within an epithelium and between epithelia of different fi shes (Popper 1976 ,
1977 , 1978a , b , 1980 ). While several of these fi shes had interesting differences in
ear morphology, some (such as the lake whitefi sh, Coregonus clupeaformis ) were
also quite tasty. Institutional Animal Care and Use Committees were quite different
back then, particularly where fi sh were concerned!
Over the years Art has published over 200 papers, with the vast majority of studies examining different aspects of fi sh hearing. His wide array of structural and
functional studies form the basis for much of our understanding of fi sh hearing and
the similarities and differences between different fi shes. A true comparative biologist, Art’s work spans many diverse fi sh phylogenetic and ecological groups.
Fig. 1 The title page from Art’s dissertation study, published in Animal Behaviour in 1970
A.B. Coffi n
Since Art didn’t want to spend 17 years in graduate school, he switched his dissertation topic to a comparative study of hearing between Mexican blind cavefi sh
and their sighted sister taxa (now considered subspecies of Astyanax mexicanus ),
demonstrating that both groups had similar ear morphology and hearing capabilities
(Popper 1970 , 1971 ; see Fig. 1 ). After graduation in 1969, Art moved to the
University of Hawaii as an assistant professor, where, in December 1971, he met a
new postdoc working with Nobel Prize winner Georg von Békésy. That postdoc—
Dr. Richard Fay—was just as fascinated with fi sh hearing as Art, and their chance
meeting at a barbeque has resulted in 25 papers (see essay by Popper in this volume), over 50 SHAR volumes (Springer Handbook of Auditory Research), and the
growth of our fi eld in fi sh bioacoustics. The fi rst Popper and Fay paper was published in 1973 with the title “Sound detection and processing by fi sh: a critical
review.” I suspect this early review was more of a strategic planning move, giving
them an excuse to review the literature so they could chart a course for the fi eld over
the next 40+ years.
After launching his independent career in Hawaii, Art moved back to the east
coast for a position at Georgetown University, then to the University of Maryland,
where he retired as Professor Emeritus in 2013. Through his long career Art has
slowly shifted his research focus from fundamental questions in comparative sensory biology to applied issues about the effects of underwater sound on fi shes and
other aquatic life. Much of Art’s early work focused on comparative morphology
between ears of fi shes from different taxonomic groups, using scanning electron
microscopy to describe variation in hair bundle morphology and bundle orientation
both within an epithelium and between epithelia of different fi shes (Popper 1976 ,
1977 , 1978a , b , 1980 ). While several of these fi shes had interesting differences in
ear morphology, some (such as the lake whitefi sh, Coregonus clupeaformis ) were
also quite tasty. Institutional Animal Care and Use Committees were quite different
back then, particularly where fi sh were concerned!
Over the years Art has published over 200 papers, with the vast majority of studies examining different aspects of fi sh hearing. His wide array of structural and
functional studies form the basis for much of our understanding of fi sh hearing and
the similarities and differences between different fi shes. A true comparative biologist, Art’s work spans many diverse fi sh phylogenetic and ecological groups.
Fig. 1 The title page from Art’s dissertation study, published in Animal Behaviour in 1970
A.B. Coffi n