Professor Tom Berman

Professor Tom Berman, who has died aged 79 after apparently falling from a cliff while hiking alone on the the Galapagos Islands, was an internationally renowned aquatic scientist. It had been a lifelong dream of his to see the Galapagos.

Prof Berman, known as "Tommy" to his friends and colleagues, had moved to Israel from Scotland in 1951 and had lived ever since at Kibbutz Amiad in the Upper Galilee. In 1939, as a five-year-old boy, he was taken out of Czechoslovakia on one of the Kindertransport rescue missions. He was one of more than 600 Jewish children transported out of the country in a special operation overseen by Sir Nicholas George Winton, then a young British stockbroker.

Aside from achieving international recognition as a specialist in limnology, the study of lake ecosystems, Prof Berman was also known for his poetry which encompassed many themes relating to his life, from the deep emotion of his experiences on the kindertransport to his work on aquatic systems. For three years, he served as editor in chief of the annual anthology published by Voices Israel, a group of poets who write in English. A collection of poetry, entitled Shards, was published in 2002..

Prof Berman was five when he arrived and left the city to settle in Israel after completing his schooling there. Friends recalled that even after living in Israel for more 50 years, he still spoke with a strong Glaswegian accent. He completed his higher education in the United States, first at Rutgers University followed by a PhD at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

His special area of academic interest was in general limnology, related to aquatic microbiology, especially as related to the Sea of Galilee.

He was among the founders of the Kinneret Limnological Laboratory in 1968. Last year, he was a recipient of a Lifetime Achievement Award by the Israeli Association for Aquatic Sciences.

He is survived by his wife, three daughters, six grand-daughters and one grandson.