Alexander Carl Heinrich Braun (10 May 1805 – 29 March 1877) was a German
botanist
Botany, also called plant science, is the branch of natural science and biology studying plants, especially Plant anatomy, their anatomy, Plant taxonomy, taxonomy, and Plant ecology, ecology. A botanist or plant scientist is a scientist who s ...
from
Regensburg, Bavaria. His research centered on the morphology of plants and was a very influential teacher who worked as a professor of botany at the universities of Freiburg, Giessen, and Berlin at various times. He was also the director of the
Berlin Botanical Garden.
Biography
Braun was born in Regensburg (Ratisbon) where his father Alexander was a tax inspector in the postal department. His mother Henriette was the daughter of a priest and mathematics professor. He studied at Karlsruhe and Freiburg (Breisgau) where his father was transferred. He went to the University of Heidelberg to study medicine. His teachers included
Gottlieb Wilhelm Bischoff,
Johann Heinrich Dierbach and
Franz Joseph Schelver. At Heidelberg he studied with
Louis Agassiz
Jean Louis Rodolphe Agassiz ( ; ) FRS (For) FRSE (May 28, 1807 – December 14, 1873) was a Swiss-born American biologist and geologist who is recognized as a scholar of Earth's natural history.
Spending his early life in Switzerland, he recei ...
,
Carl Schimper and
George Engelmann. Agassiz would marry Braun's sister Cecilie while Schimper was engaged briefly to Braun's sister Emilie. He completed his studies at Paris and
Munich
Munich is the capital and most populous city of Bavaria, Germany. As of 30 November 2024, its population was 1,604,384, making it the third-largest city in Germany after Berlin and Hamburg. Munich is the largest city in Germany that is no ...
. In 1833 he began teaching botany at the Polytechnic School of
Karlsruhe, staying there until 1846. Afterwards he was a professor of botany in
Freiburg
Freiburg im Breisgau or simply Freiburg is the List of cities in Baden-Württemberg by population, fourth-largest city of the German state of Baden-Württemberg after Stuttgart, Mannheim and Karlsruhe. Its built-up area has a population of abou ...
(from 1846),
Giessen
Giessen, spelled in German (), is a town in the Germany, German States of Germany, state () of Hesse, capital of both the Giessen (district), district of Giessen and the Giessen (region), administrative region of Giessen. The population is appro ...
(from 1850) and at the
University of Berlin (1851), where he remained until 1877. While in Berlin, he was also director of the
botanical garden. He designed the layout which was later documented by Paul Friedrich August Ascherson. In 1852, he was elected a foreign member of the
Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences. With
Gottlob Ludwig Rabenhorst (1806–1881) and
Ernst Stizenberger (1827–1895), he was editor of the
exsiccata series ''Die Characeen Europa's in getrockneten Exemplaren, unter Mitwirkung mehrerer Freunde der Botanik, gesammelt und herausgegeben von Prof. A. Braun, L. Rabenhorst und E. Stizenberger''.
Braun is largely known for his research involving
plant morphology. He accepted evolution but was a critic of
Darwinism. He was a proponent of
vitalism, a popular 19th-century speculative theory that claimed that a regulative force existed within living matter in order to maintain functionality. Braun made important contributions in the field of
cell theory. His students included
August Wilhelm Eichler.
From his 1830s analysis of the arrangement of scales on a
pine cone he was a pioneer of mathematical
phyllotaxis developing what is called the Schimper-Braun theory.
In 1877,
Wilhelm Philippe Schimper and
Philipp Bruch named the plant genus ''
Braunia'' in his honor. Also, a decorative plant known as "Braun's holly
fern" (''
Polystichum braunii'') commemorates his name.
Encyclopedia of garden ferns by Suzanne Olsen
Published works
* 1831: ''Untersuchung über die Ordnung der Schuppen an den Tannenzapfen'' (Investigation on the order of shapes in pine cones).
* 1842: ''Nachträgliche Mitteilungen über die Gattungen Marsilia und Pilularia'' (Additional releases on the genera Marsilea and Pilularia).
* 1851: ''Betrachtungen über die Erscheinung der Verjüngung in der Natur, insbesondere in der Lebens- und Bildungsgeschichte der Pflanze'' (Leipzig, 198 pp.) (Reflections on the phenomenon of rejuvenation in nature, particularly in the life and developmental history of the plant).
* 1852: ''Über die Richtungsverhältnisse der Saftströme in den Zellen der Characeen''. (on directional conditions involving juice flow in the cell of Characeae).
* 1853: ''Das Individuum der Pflanze in seinem Verhältnis zur Spezies etc.'' (The individual plant in its relation to species, etc.).
* 1854: ''Über den schiefen Verlauf der Holzfaser und die dadurch bedingte Drehung der Stämme''
* 1854: ''Über einige neue und weniger bekannte Krankheiten der Pflanzen, welche durch Pilze erzeugt werden'' (On new and lesser-known diseases of plants produced by fungi).
* 1854: ''Das Individuum der Species in seinem Verhältnis zur Pflanze'' (The individual of the species in its relationship to the plant).
* 1855: "Algarum unicellularium genera nova et minus cognita".
* 1856: ''Über Chytridium, eine Gattung einzelliger Schmarotzergewächse auf Algen und Infusorien'' (On Chytridium, a genus of unicellular parasites on algae
Algae ( , ; : alga ) is an informal term for any organisms of a large and diverse group of photosynthesis, photosynthetic organisms that are not plants, and includes species from multiple distinct clades. Such organisms range from unicellular ...
and infusoria).
* 1857: ''Über Parthenogenesis bei Pflanzen'' (On parthenogenesis in plants)
* 1860: ''Über Polyembryonie und Keimung von Caelebogyne'' ( Polyembryony and germination of Caelebogyne).
* 1861: ''Index seminum Horti Botanici Berolinensis: Appendix Plantarum Novrum et minus cognitarum quea in Horto region botanico Berolinensi coluntur''.
* 1862: ''Über die Bedeutung der Morphologie'' (On the importance of morphology).
* 1862: ''Zwei deutsche Isoetesarten'' (Two German Isoëtes species).
* 1863: ''Über Isoetes'' (On quillworts).
* 1865: ''Beitrag zur Kenntnis der Gattung Selaginella'' (Contribution to the knowledge of the genus Selaginella).
* 1867: ''Die Characeen Afrikas'' (African Characeae).
* 1867: "Conspectus systematicus Characearum europaearum".
* 1870: ''Neuere Untersuchungen über die Gattungen Marsilia und Pilularia'' (Recent studies on the genera Marsilea and Pilularia).
* 1872: ''Über die Bedeutung der Entwicklung in der Naturgeschichte'' (On the importance of development in natural history).
See also
* University of Freiburg Faculty of Biology
Notes
References
* This article is based on a translation of the equivalent article at the German Wikipedia.
Biography
at Deutsche Biographie.
Further reading
* ''Alexander Braun''. In: ''Leopoldina'' — On line
part 1, 1871–1872, p. 50–60
* A. W. Eichler. ''Rede bei der Enthüllung des Denkmals von Alexander Braun'', 1879
External links
*
{{DEFAULTSORT:Braun, Alexander
1805 births
1877 deaths
19th-century German botanists
Biologists from the Kingdom of Prussia
Non-Darwinian evolution
Scientists from Regensburg
Scientists from the Kingdom of Bavaria
Heidelberg University alumni
University of Paris alumni
Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich alumni
Academic staff of the Humboldt University of Berlin
Academic staff of the University of Freiburg
Academic staff of the University of Giessen
Members of the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences
Foreign associates of the National Academy of Sciences
Vitalists
German expatriates in France