Swedish medical practitioner and hepaticologist Sigfrid Arnell was the son of Swedish bryologist Hampus Wilhelm Arnell. As a young student, S.W. Arnell produced some papers on vascular plants, but then put botany aside for a medical career. After completing his studies at Uppsala and Stockholm, he worked at the hospital in his native city, Gävle, where he was head of the X-ray department from 1927 until his retirement in 1960.
In his mid-40s Arnell began studying liverworts, first the Fennoscandian hepatics, which he wrote up in Hepaticae (1956), and, then, hepatics of the southern hemisphere, particularly those of South Africa, where he travelled for four months in 1951. His Hepaticae of South Africa, published in 1963, was the first of its kind and, for all its shortcomings, is the foundation for subsequent studies of liverworts from the region. His publications on African taxa were mainly based on collections made by others.
After retiring Arnell settled in Bromma, Stockholm, where he was associated with the State Museum of Natural History, and after 1963 in Uppsala. In later life he suffered from Parkinson's disease and was troubled by rapidly failing eyesight; and in his eagerness to work while he still could, he made mistakes in some of his determinations. While he was still fit he made collecting journeys to West Spitzbergen (1956), the Canary Islands (1958 and 1959), northern Sweden (1960), and, lastly, to Egypt (1961). Despite being an amateur and doing all his work in his spare time and at his own expense, he produced 79 publications before his disability forced him to abandon all scientific work in 1965. He was recognised within the scientific community for his contributions to hepaticology and elected an honorary member of the British Bryological Society in 1951, and receiving an honorary doctorate from Uppsala in 1958.
Sources:
G. Een and S.M. Perold, 2000, "In Memory of S.W. Arnell, Hepaticologist (1895-1970)", Bothalia, 30(2): 218-220
O. Mårtensson, 1972, "Obituary: Sigrid W. Arnell (1895-1970)", Journal of Bryology, 7: 239-242.
