George Karsten (3 November 1863 – 7 May 1937) was a German

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 ...

born in

Rostock Rostock (), officially the Hanseatic and University City of Rostock (german: link=no, Hanse- und Universitätsstadt Rostock), is the largest city in the German state of Mecklenburg-Vorpommern and lies in the Mecklenburgian part of the state, c ...

. In 1885 he earned his doctorate from the

University of Strasbourg The University of Strasbourg (french: Université de Strasbourg, Unistra) is a public research university located in Strasbourg, Alsace, France, with over 52,000 students and 3,300 researchers. The French university traces its history to the ea ...

, and in 1892 received his habilitation in botany at the

University of Leipzig Leipzig University (german: Universität Leipzig), in Leipzig in Saxony, Germany, is one of the world's oldest universities and the second-oldest university (by consecutive years of existence) in Germany. The university was founded on 2 Decemb ...

. Later on, he served as an associate professor at the Universities of

Kiel Kiel () is the capital and most populous city in the northern Germany, German state of Schleswig-Holstein, with a population of 246,243 (2021). Kiel lies approximately north of Hamburg. Due to its geographic location in the southeast of the J ...

(1898) and

Bonn The federal city of Bonn ( lat, Bonna) is a city on the banks of the Rhine in the German state of North Rhine-Westphalia, with a population of over 300,000. About south-southeast of Cologne, Bonn is in the southernmost part of the Rhine-Ruhr r ...

(from 1899). In 1909 he became a professor at the

University of Halle Martin Luther University of Halle-Wittenberg (german: Martin-Luther-Universität Halle-Wittenberg), also referred to as MLU, is a public, research-oriented university in the cities of Halle and Wittenberg and the largest and oldest university i ...

and was appointed director of the

botanical garden A botanical garden or botanic gardenThe terms ''botanic'' and ''botanical'' and ''garden'' or ''gardens'' are used more-or-less interchangeably, although the word ''botanic'' is generally reserved for the earlier, more traditional gardens, an ...

14-06-28-Laurentiusfriedhof-Halle-RalfR-DSC 0399-59

With

Heinrich Schenck Johann Heinrich Rudolf Schenck (31 January 1860 – 25 June 1927) was a German botanist who was a native of Siegen. He was a brother to geographer Adolf Schenck (1857–1936). Heinrich Schenck initially studied natural sciences at the University ...

(1860–1927), he was editor of a popular journal of botany called ''Vegetationsbilder''.Nature as the Laboratory
by Eugene Cittadino Karsten is remembered for his studies of

phytoplankton Phytoplankton () are the autotrophic (self-feeding) components of the plankton community and a key part of ocean and freshwater ecosystems. The name comes from the Greek words (), meaning 'plant', and (), meaning 'wanderer' or 'drifter'. Ph ...

, and among his written works are publications on phytoplankton collected from the deep-sea Valdivia Expedition of 1898–99: * ''Lehrbuch der Pharmakognosie des Pflanzenreiches für Hochschulen und zum Selbstunterricht mit Rücksicht auf das neue deutsche Arzneibuch'' (1903
Digital edition
by the

University and State Library Düsseldorf The University and State Library Düsseldorf (german: Universitäts- und Landesbibliothek Düsseldorf, abbreviated ULB Düsseldorf) is a central service institution of Heinrich Heine University. Along with Bonn and Münster, it is also one of th ...

* ''Das Phytoplankton des Antarktischen Meeres nach dem Material der deutschen Tiefsee-Expedition 1898-1899'' (Phytoplankton of the Antarctic Seas from the German Deep-sea Valdivia Expedition); (1905). * ''Das Phytoplankton des Atlantischen Ozeans nach dem Material der deutschen Tiefsee-Expedition 1898-1899'' (Phytoplankton of the

Atlantic Ocean The Atlantic Ocean is the second-largest of the world's five oceans, with an area of about . It covers approximately 20% of Earth's surface and about 29% of its water surface area. It is known to separate the " Old World" of Africa, Europe ...

from the German Deep-sea Valdivia Expedition); (1906). * ''Das Indische Phytoplankton nach dem Material der Deutschen Tiefsee-Expedition 1898-1899'' (Phytoplankton of the

Indian Ocean The Indian Ocean is the third-largest of the world's five oceanic divisions, covering or ~19.8% of the water on Earth's surface. It is bounded by Asia to the north, Africa to the west and Australia to the east. To the south it is bounded by th ...

from the German Deep-sea Valdivia Expedition); (1907).

References

Catalogus-professorum-halensis
(translated biography of George Karsten)
Koeltz Scientific Books
(publications) People from Rostock 1863 births 1937 deaths University of Kiel faculty University of Bonn faculty University of Halle faculty 19th-century German botanists 20th-century German botanists {{Germany-botanist-stub