Geologist, Palaeontologist, researcher of Siberia, he filled in the blanks in its map, and was responsible for mapping previously unknown geological regions of Russia

Aleksander Czekanowski’s father, Wawrzyniec, was a passionate entomologist and collector of insects. But it would be because of his son – prisoner of tsarist Russia, exiled barefoot to Siberia – that insects, arachnids, plants, mountains passes would carry his name…

Naturalist, physician, explorer of Siberia and Kamchatka, distinguished contributor to the study of Lake Baikal, called the “father of Polish limnology”

“As a young boy in Lithuania, I heard stories about the life and deeds of Dybowski told by exiles returning from Siberia. In the long winter evenings I would avidly listen – as to the adventures of Robinson Crusoe – as Dybowski, Dubiecki and Kietliński built a hut in Darasun or chopped ice to set nets to catch the creatures of Lake Baikal; or as Dybowski, preparing for an expedition on the Amur river, built a ship and then as he helped out the lepers in the Commander Islands” recalled Julian Talko-Hrycewicz, professor of the Jagiellonian University in Cracow (Domaniewski, 1954). For his generation Benedykt Dybowski was a true hero.