Helena Vladimirovna Shaverdo is a Belarusian-Austrian entomologist and researcher specializing in predaceous diving beetles of the family Dytiscidae. Her work addresses beetle taxonomy, larval morphology, phylogeny, biogeography, faunistics, ecology, and phenology, including the description of numerous species and a new genus.
Background
Helena Vladimirovna Shaverdo was born in Minsk, Belarus, on October 10, 1974, and spent her school years in Orsha, where she completed primary and secondary education in 1991 with a silver medal. Her scientific interest in aquatic beetles developed during her university years under the influence of zoologist I. K. Lopatin and coleopterist A. S. Konstantinov. She also undertook scientific visits to the Zoological Institute of the Russian Academy of Sciences and subsequently developed a long-term specialization in the predaceous diving beetles of the subfamily Hydroporinae. She has lived and worked in Vienna since 2003 and became an Austrian citizen in 2019.
Education
Shaverdo studied zoology at the Faculty of Biology of Belarusian State University in Minsk from 1991 to 1996. She completed the program with an honorary diploma qualifying her as a biologist and teacher of biology and chemistry; her diploma research examined the faunistics, ecology, and zoogeography of predaceous water beetles in Belarus and received the highest evaluation. From 1996 to 1999 she pursued postgraduate studies at the Institute of Zoology of the National Academy of Sciences of Belarus. On March 23, 2000, she received her Ph.D. for the dissertation “Beetles of the family Dytiscidae (Coleoptera: Adephaga) of Belarus: larval morphology, fauna, phenology.” In 2002–2003 she conducted postdoctoral research at the University of Manitoba in Winnipeg on the systematics and faunistics of the genus Hydroporus in the Palearctic and Nearctic regions.
Career
Shaverdo began her professional research career at the Entomology Department of the Institute of Zoology of the National Academy of Sciences of Belarus, first as a junior researcher from 1999 to 2000 and then as a researcher from 2000 to 2003. Alongside her Belarusian appointment, she carried out a postdoctoral project at the University of Manitoba in Winnipeg in 2002–2003, concentrating on Hydroporus systematics and faunistics with support from the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada and a NATO Science Fellowship. After moving permanently to Vienna in 2003, she worked as a research associate at the Naturhistorisches Museum Wien from 2003 to 2010 and as an independent contractor there from 2010 to 2011. Since October 2011 she has managed the museum’s Coleoptera collection; from 2012 to 2017 and again from 2018 to 2024 she led Austrian Science Fund projects on the taxonomy, phylogeny, and biogeography of Australasian and New Guinean diving beetles. Since April 2024 she has served as Coleoptera collection manager and assistant in the Lepidoptera collection. Her research has covered Dytiscidae from Belarus, the Nearctic, Mongolia, Iran, Myanmar, Thailand, Cambodia, New Guinea, and other regions, combining taxonomic revision with larval morphology, molecular and morphological phylogenetics, biogeography, faunistics, ecology, and phenology.
Achievements
Conducted research on the taxonomy, larval morphology, phylogeny, biogeography, faunistics, ecology, and phenology of predaceous water beetles of the family Dytiscidae.
Discovered and described one genus, 140 species, and six subspecies of Dytiscidae in collaboration with other researchers.
Produced taxonomic revisions and faunistic studies of Hydroporus, Exocelina, Copelatus, Hyphydrus, and other diving-beetle genera.
Contributed the Dytiscidae larval section to Keys to the Freshwater Invertebrates of Russia and Neighbouring Territories.
Works
Book Chapter
Sem. Dytiscidae (lichinki) [Fam. Dytiscidae (larvae)]
(Chapter on Dytiscidae larvae in volume 5 of Keys to the F...)
2001
Journal Article
Mosaic patterns of diversification dynamics following the colonization of Melanesian islands
(Co-authored study of diversification dynamics after colon...)
(Co-authored description of three new species and introduc...)
2020
Description of the larva of Canthyporus kenyensis Bilardo & Sanfilippo (Coleoptera: Dytiscidae: Hydroporinae) with implication for the phylogeny of the Hydroporini
(Co-authored study of larval morphology and its implicatio...)
(Nomenclatural article co-authored with Manfred A. Jäch.)
2003
Membership
Shaverdo has been associated with the Belarus Entomological Society since 1993, the Balfour-Browne Club since 1995, and the Russian Entomological Society since 1997. She participated in meetings of the Balfour-Browne Club, including the 1997 meeting in Liberec, Czech Republic, and in the XI Congress of the Russian Entomological Society. She has also served on the editorial board of the journal Aquatic Insects.
Member since 1993.
Belarus Entomological Society
,
Belarus
1993 - present
Member since 1995; participated in the 1997 meeting in Liberec, Czech Republic.
Balfour-Browne Club
,
United Kingdom
1995 - present
Admitted in 1997 and participated in the society’s XI Congress.
Russian Entomological Society
,
Russia
1997 - present
Member of the editorial board.
Aquatic Insects editorial board
2020 - present
Connections
Shaverdo is the daughter of Marina Iosifovna Shaverdo and Vladimir Vladimirovich Shaverdo. She is married to entomologist Harald Schillhammer and has a daughter, Nadja Marina Schillhammer. Her professional collaborations include long-term research with colleagues at the Naturhistorisches Museum Wien, the Zoological State Collection in Munich, and other institutions working on Dytiscidae systematics.
Father:
Vladimir Vladimirovich Shaverdo
Father of Helena Vladimirovna Shaverdo.
Mother:
Marina Iosifovna Shaverdo
Mother of Helena Vladimirovna Shaverdo.
husband:
Harald Schillhammer
Husband of Helena Vladimirovna Shaverdo; a fellow entomological researcher associated with the Naturhistorisches Museum Wien.
Daughter:
Nadja Marina Schillhammer
Daughter of Helena Vladimirovna Shaverdo and Harald Schillhammer.
References
Naturhistorisches Museum Wien staff profile
Documents Shaverdo’s birth, education, doctoral research, professional appointments, research interests, awards, discoveries, and current work as collection manager at the Naturhistorisches Museum Wien.
2026
Institute of Zoology, Russian Academy of Sciences profile
Documents Shaverdo’s early specialization in Dytiscidae, education, doctoral dissertation, professional memberships, research on beetle larvae, and postdoctoral work at the University of Manitoba.
2000
Naturhistorisches Museum Wien Annual Report 2024
Documents the Austrian Science Fund project led by Shaverdo and its taxonomic results, including the description of a new genus and numerous new Dytiscidae species.
