Emmanuel Geoffroy (1862 December 12, Saintes–1894) was a French

botanist Botany, also called , plant biology or phytology, is the science of plant life and a branch of biology. A botanist, plant scientist or phytologist is a scientist who specialises in this field. The term "botany" comes from the Ancient Greek wo ...

and explorer. Geoffroy traveled to Martinique and French Guiana in search of latex-yielding trees, but also studied the region's native plants in the genus '' Robinia'' after learning that forest Indians of French Guiana used ''Robinia'' as fish poisons. One in particular, "''Robinia''" ''nicou'', which is now considered to be '' Lonchocarpus nicou'', was to be the subject of his thesis, french: Contribution à l'étude du Robinia Nicou Aubl. au point de vue botanique, chimique et physiologique. In a fact to be discovered posthumously, Geoffroy unknowingly discovered rotenone, which he originally named ''nicouline''. He died in 1894 as a result of a parasitic disease.

References

* * 1862 births 1894 deaths 19th-century French botanists French explorers {{France-botanist-stub