George Matthai

Professor George Matthai (13 November 1887 – 22 June 1947) was an Indian zoologist who specialized in marine biology, contributing to the systematics of Madreporarian (now Scleractinia) corals. He worked as a professor of zoology at the Panjab University in Lahore.

Matthai was born in a Syrian Christian family from Calicut where his father Thomas worked in the Madras Education Service. He was educated at Zamorin's College, Calicut, followed by Madras Christian College where he obtained a BA (1907) and MA (1909). He joined Emmanuel College in 1911 at the University of Cambridge where a contemporary was Birbal Sahni. He worked with Professor J. Stanley Gardiner on the comparative anatomy of Astraeid corals. He received the BA of Cambridge in 1913 and received a Balfour Fund grant to continue research. In 1914 he published on the histology of the Astraeid corals and received a Mackinnon Research studentship that allowed him to visit museums around the world. He returned to India in 1918 and worked at the department of zoology at the Panjab University, Lahore. He received a ScD from the University of Cambridge in 1929. He succeeded Lt. Col. J. Stephenson in 1919 and his retirement in 1942 was postponed to 1945 due to the war.[1][2]

Matthai married Mary Chandy, daughter of C. Chandy of the Mysore Civil Service and later vice chancellor of Mysore University, in 1925. They had a son, Ariel, and after her death in 1931, Matthai married Rosalinda Hedwig in 1935. Matthai was elected Fellow of the Zoological Society of London in 1921 as well as the Linnean Society.[3]