John Laker Harley (17 November 1911 – 12 December 1990) was a British botanist, known for his work on

ectomycorrhizal An ectomycorrhiza (from Greek ἐκτός ', "outside", μύκης ', "fungus", and ῥίζα ', "root"; ectomycorrhizas or ectomycorrhizae, abbreviated EcM) is a form of symbiotic relationship that occurs between a fungal symbiont, or mycobion ...

physiology.

Early life, education, and war service

Harley was born at Old Charlton, then in

Kent Kent is a Ceremonial counties of England, ceremonial county in South East England. It is bordered by Essex across the Thames Estuary to the north, the Strait of Dover to the south-east, East Sussex to the south-west, Surrey to the west, and Gr ...

, in 1911, to Edith Sarah (née Smith) and Charles Laker Harley, a Post Office civil servant. He attended

Leeds Grammar School Leeds Grammar School was an independent school founded 1552 in Leeds, West Yorkshire, England. Originally a male-only school, in August 2005 it merged with Leeds Girls' High School to form The Grammar School at Leeds. The two schools physica ...

and was awarded an exhibition to

Wadham College Wadham College ( ) is a constituent college of the University of Oxford in the United Kingdom. It is located in the centre of Oxford, at the intersection of Broad Street and Parks Road. Wadham College was founded in 1610 by Dorothy Wadham, a ...

University of Oxford The University of Oxford is a collegiate university, collegiate research university in Oxford, England. There is evidence of teaching as early as 1096, making it the oldest university in the English-speaking world and the List of oldest un ...

, going up to read botany in 1930. There he was taught by A. G. Tansley and became interested in

ecology Ecology () is the natural science of the relationships among living organisms and their Natural environment, environment. Ecology considers organisms at the individual, population, community (ecology), community, ecosystem, and biosphere lev ...

and

plant physiology Plant physiology is a subdiscipline of botany concerned with the functioning, or physiology, of plants. Plant physiologists study fundamental processes of plants, such as photosynthesis, respiration, plant nutrition, plant hormone functions, tr ...

. His D.Phil. thesis was on

mycorrhiza A mycorrhiza (; , mycorrhiza, or mycorrhizas) is a symbiotic association between a fungus and a plant. The term mycorrhiza refers to the role of the fungus in the plant's rhizosphere, the plant root system and its surroundings. Mycorrhizae play ...

s, supervised by W. H. Wilkins. In 1939, he was appointed demonstrator in botany, but his research was interrupted by the war. He joined the Royal Signals Corps and served in India, Burma and Ceylon (1940–45), attaining the rank of lieutenant-colonel.

Career

After the war he was appointed a fellow of Queen's College (1946). In 1958 he transferred to the department of agriculture and restarted his work on mycorrhiza. In 1962 he was appointed to a readership in plant nutrition. He was a professor of botany at

Sheffield University The University of Sheffield (informally Sheffield University or TUOS) is a public research university in Sheffield, South Yorkshire, England. Its history traces back to the foundation of Sheffield Medical School in 1828, Firth College in 1879 ...

(1965–69). With

Howard Florey Howard Walter Florey, Baron Florey, (; 24 September 1898 – 21 February 1968) was an Australian pharmacologist and pathologist who shared the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine in 1945 with Ernst Chain and Sir Alexander Fleming for his ro ...

, he was involved in writing the Florey Report on the structure of Oxford's biology departments in 1966, and returned to Oxford to hold the newly renamed chair of forest science (1969–1979), overseeing the amalgamation of the forestry and agriculture departments. The chair was associated with a fellowship at St John's College. In retirement he co-wrote the book ''Mycorrhizal Symbiosis'' with his daughter Sally E. Smith (1983) and ''A Check-list of Mycorrhiza in the British Flora'' with his wife (1987). He was a co-editor of the ''

New Phytologist ''New Phytologist'' is a peer-reviewed scientific journal published on behalf of the New Phytologist Foundation by Wiley-Blackwell. It covers all aspects of botany and was established in 1902 by Arthur Tansley, who served as editor until 1931. M ...

'' (1961–83). He was elected a

fellow of the Royal Society Fellowship of the Royal Society (FRS, ForMemRS and HonFRS) is an award granted by the Fellows of the Royal Society of London to individuals who have made a "substantial contribution to the improvement of natural science, natural knowledge, incl ...

(1964), and received the CBE (1979) and the

Linnean Society The Linnean Society of London is a learned society dedicated to the study and dissemination of information concerning natural history, evolution, and taxonomy. It possesses several important biological specimen, manuscript and literature collec ...

's Gold Medal for Botany (1989). He was president of the British Mycological Society (1969), the

British Ecological Society The British Ecological Society is a learned society in the field of ecology that was founded in 1913. It is the oldest ecological society in the world. The Society's original objective was "to promote and foster the study of Ecology in its widest ...

(1970–72) and the

Institute of Biology The Institute of Biology (IoB) was a professional body for biologists, primarily those working in the United Kingdom. The Institute was founded in 1950 by the Biological Council: the then umbrella body for Britain's many learned biological societie ...

(1984–86).

Personal life

In 1938, he married E. Lindsay Fitt, a fellow student at Oxford who also worked for a D.Phil. They had a son and a daughter. Harley died in 1990.

Selected publications

*John Laker Harley, J. S. Waid (1955). "A method of studying active mycelia on living roots and other surfaces in the soil", '' Transactions of the British Mycological Society'' 38: 104–118 – "a Citation Classic"

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Harley, Jack 1911 births 1990 deaths Fellows of the Royal Society Commanders of the Order of the British Empire Fellows of the Linnean Society of London Fellows of the Queen's College, Oxford Fellows of St John's College, Oxford British plant physiologists British Army personnel of World War II Royal Corps of Signals officers Presidents of the British Ecological Society