French botanist and entomologist. Alfred Pételot collected in the former French colonies of Indo-China and published mainly on medicinal plants of the region. He was appointed lecturer at the Faculté Mixte de Médecine et de Pharmacie in Saigon and later head of the botanical division of the Centre de Recherces Scientifiques et Techniques. Pételot was also a laureate of the Académie des Sciences in Paris and his original material was deposited at the Muséum National d'Histoire Naturelle (P). He died some time after the Japanese occupation of the French colony during the Second World War. Many Asiatic taxa of the region were named after him including Arisaema petelotii K. Krause, Caulokaempferia petelotii K. Larsen and Schefflera petelotii Merr.