{"id":3159,"date":"2017-09-26T12:19:59","date_gmt":"2017-09-26T11:19:59","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.bbv-sbss.be\/?p=3159"},"modified":"2017-09-26T12:19:59","modified_gmt":"2017-09-26T11:19:59","slug":"in-memoriam-prof-jules-dhoore-1917-2017","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.soilbelgium.be\/?p=3159","title":{"rendered":"In Memoriam Prof. Jules D’Hoore (1917-2017)"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>Jules D\u2019Hoore was born in Sluis (the Netherlands) on 7th<\/sup> May 1917, while his family was on exile as Belgian refugees during WWI.\u00a0 After the war his family returned to Bruges where he followed the Greek-Latin option at St. Lodewijkscollege. During the WWII Jules\u2019s university studies were disturbed by the war mobilization and he was war prisoner for a short period. Eventually he obtained his diploma of Engineering in Chemistry and Agricultural Industries from the State Higher Agronomic Institute in Ghent 1943. He stayed on as assistant at the Faculty of Sciences of the State University of Ghent, in the Laboratory of Analytical Chemistry (Prof. J. Gillis).<\/p>\n

In 1946, Jules undertook his first mission to Congo as assistant researcher in the Department of Agrology, INEAC, Yangambi. While serving as visiting Researcher of Wisconsin, USA in 1949 he made visits to soil laboratories of the Universities of Ames, Cornell, and Pennsylvania\u00a0 State and to the US Soil Conservation Service, Washington, DC. In 1951 Jules participated to an OECE mission (3 months) in western Africa in company of L.T. Alexander (USA), R. Maignien and G. Aubert (France), and C. Bloomfield (UK): field study of laterisation phenomena.<\/p>\n

In 1950 Jules D’Hoore started his doctoral project under supervision of L. De Leenheer at the then State Higher Agronomic Institute in Ghent (which later became the Faculty of Agricultural Sciences of the University of Ghent). On 10th September 1953 he defended summa cum laude his thesis with title ‘The Accumulation of free Sesquioxides in Tropical Soils’. He was the first to obtain his PhD at this Institute\/Faculty, not his last pioneer achievement. With this thesis he became a world authority on the processes which lead to laterite soils (present-day Plinthosols).<\/p>\n

In 1953 he was detached to the Commission for Technical Cooperation in Africa (CCTA) as Director of the Service P\u00e9dologique Africain \/ Interafrican Pedological Service (SPI). In 1954 Jules was involved in the preparation of the \u201cII\u00b0 Conf\u00e9rence Interafricaine des Sols\u201d (2nd Inter-African Soil Conference) and the International Soil Congress of Leopoldville, Congo. In this period he started assembling the soil map of Africa at 1\/5,000,000 scale. For that purpose he made several visits to the major soil centers of Africa and Madagascar along with field work during numerous soil correlation meetings with regional soil scientists active in Africa.<\/p>\n

During his fourth mission to Congo in 1956 he designed a first approximation of the Soil Resources Map of Africa and of its provisional legend. This map was verified during numerous regional workshops all over Africa. The third approximation of the Soil Resources Map of African was presented in 1960 during the 7th<\/sup> International Soil Congress at Madison, USA. At that time, the baseline documentation of that map, stored in Yangambi, becomes inaccessible, because of the evacuation of this research center. Jules had no other option than reconstituting this documentation by personal mailing to correspondents. He was temporary hosted by the \u201cService P\u00e9dologique Interafricain\u201d (Inter African Soil Service) in Ghent, thanks to the hospitality of Professor De Leenheer and Professor Tavernier. In 1962 he is assigned as member of the \u201cAdvisory Committee Project World Soil Map\u201d, FAO-Unesco.<\/p>\n

In 1962 Jules joins the Centre for Tropical Soil Studies at Katholieke Universiteit Leuven. He drafts the Fifth Approximation of the Soil Resources Map of Africa which is eventually published in 1963 in French and in English along with its legend and an elaborate explanatory text.<\/p>\n

In 1970 Jules makes a study visit to the Goddard Space Flight Center, Maryland, USA and studies remote sensing techniques and their usability for soil observation and broad scale soil\u00a0 mapping. As of then he is prominently present in international fora on remote sensing (ESRO) as delegate from Belgium, among many others the new department of Remote Sensing of the Joint Research Centre, EURATOM, Ispra, Italy. He also was the inspirator of a state funded programme on remote sensing studies in Belgium. In 1976 he becomes the permanent Belgian member at the Remote Sensing Advisory Group at ESA (European Space Agency), charged by the Science Policy Office, Brussels.<\/p>\n

Also in that year he is elected President\u00a0 of the Soil Science Society of Belgium. As of 1977 Jules is\u00a0 member of the \u201cKlasse voor Natuur- en Geneeskundige Wetenschappen van de Koninklijke\u00a0 Academie voor Overzeese Wetenschappen\u201d (Class for Nature and Medical\u00a0 Sciences of the Royal Academy of Overseas Sciences). He also gets actively involved in the first versions of Belgium-supported Inter-University Development Cooperation with missions to Zambia, Malaysia, Thailand and Congo. In 1983 Jules is \u00a0Entitled Member of the Class for Nature and Medical Sciences, Royal\u00a0 Academy of Overseas Sciences. During his professional career, Jules D\u2019Hoore was honored several times with awards such as the price \u201cWetteren\u201d, Royal Academy of Sciences, Belgium (together with J. Fripiat), the \u201cMedal Order of the Lion\u201d and \u201cGreat Officer in the Leopold Order\u201d.<\/p>\n

With his lectures edging at the frontline of scientific development, Jules D\u2019Hoore was an excellent professor, giving his students a world view on soil genesis and soil geography, and a strong feel for interdisciplinarity, as he had worked with agronomists, geologists, ecologists and others during his career. With his Soil Resources Map of Africa he made school internationally and this valuable document still remains till today an important reference milestone from where new tropical natural resources work is starting. Jules D’Hoore\u2019s soil map of Africa was recently the center-piece of the \u2018Africa in Profile exhibition\u2019 which was organized at KU Leuven to mark the International year of the Soil in 2016. For the occasion, Jules kindly allowed recording an elaborate interview in which he reflects on his Soil Resources Map of Africa.<\/p>\n