Katherine Warington (5 September 1897 – 3 July 1993) was a botanist and the first person to show that

boron Boron is a chemical element with the symbol B and atomic number 5. In its crystalline form it is a brittle, dark, lustrous metalloid; in its amorphous form it is a brown powder. As the lightest element of the ''boron group'' it has th ...

, as boric acid, was essential for the healthy growth of plants.Warington, K. (1923) "The effect of boric acid and borax on the broad bean and certain other plants". ''Annals of Botany'' 37 pp. 629-672

Early life and education

Katherine Warington was born in

Harpenden Harpenden () is a town and civil parish in the City and District of St Albans in the county of Hertfordshire, England. The population of the built-up area was 30,240 in the 2011 census, whilst the population of the civil parish was 29,448. Har ...

Hertfordshire Hertfordshire ( or ; often abbreviated Herts) is one of the home counties in southern England. It borders Bedfordshire and Cambridgeshire to the north, Essex to the east, Greater London to the south, and Buckinghamshire to the west. For govern ...

on 5 September 1897, a twin and one of the five daughters of Helen Louisa Makins and the

agricultural chemist Agricultural chemistry is the study of chemistry, especially organic chemistry and biochemistry, as they relate to agriculture—agricultural production (economics), production, the food processing, processing of raw products into foods and beverag ...

Robert Warington Robert Warington FRS (7 September 1807 – 17 November 1867) was an English chemist considered the driving force behind the creation of the world's first enduring chemistry society, The Chemical Society of London, which later became the Royal Soci ...

FRS nr She was educated at the all-women Holloway College, University of London graduating with a B.Sc (Hons) in Botany in 1921. In 1923 she gained her MSc from the University of London with her thesis: The effect of boric acid and borax on the broad bean and certain other plants. In 1928 she studied spectrographic methods of analysis under Professor Lundegårdh at

Experimentalfältet Experimentalfältet ("the field for experiments") was an area in Frescati in northern Stockholm that was used by the Royal Swedish Academy of Agriculture and Forestry from the early 19th century until the 1960s. In the 1960s its mission was ch ...

, Stockholm. Her work on boron was the basis for her D.Sc. from the

University of London The University of London (UoL; abbreviated as Lond or more rarely Londin in post-nominals) is a federal public research university located in London, England, United Kingdom. The university was established by royal charter in 1836 as a degree ...

Career

Katherine Warington's father had worked at

Rothamsted Experimental Station Rothamsted Research, previously known as the Rothamsted Experimental Station and then the Institute of Arable Crops Research, is one of the oldest agricultural research institutions in the world, having been founded in 1843. It is located at Harp ...

. Here she began as a voluntary worker, much like visiting scientists today.(1987) 'Happy Birthday Katherine Warington'. ''Micronutrient News'' 8(1) p. 3 She was then appointed to the Botany Department in 1921, working with Dr. Winifred Brenchley. Warington's work with boron came about because an entomologist wanted to find a way of making bean plants distasteful to

black fly A black fly or blackfly (sometimes called a buffalo gnat, turkey gnat, or white socks) is any member of the family Simuliidae of the Culicomorpha infraorder. It is related to the Ceratopogonidae, Chironomidae, and Thaumaleidae. Over 2,200 speci ...

(''

Aphis ''Aphis'' is a genus of insects in the family Aphididae containing at least 600 species of aphids. It includes many notorious agricultural pests, such as the soybean aphid '' Aphis glycines''. Many species of ''Aphis'', such as '' A. coreopsidis ...

''). The botanists were responsible for supplying solutions with a range of concentrations of various elements for water culture solutions. These included several elements, of which boron was one, not previously recognized as plant nutrients. Using the solutions he found that all his plants died except those given boron.Nicol, H. (1942) 'What the plant does with its materials'. ''Nature'' 3792 p.13 Warington's work required meticulous care as she had to maintain a boron free solution as her control throughout the life of the beans. Her test solution concentrations were as low as 5 ppm (parts per million). Everyone coming into the glasshouse had first to wash their hands even if they weren't going to handle the plants. By 1923 she had published the proof that boron was essential to the healthy growth of broad beans. Dr Hugh Nicol commented "It is not given to everyone to found a minor industry with her first piece of research, yet this, in effect, happened in her case...the agricultural consumption of boron compounds attained considerable dimension". Warington went on to produce papers on other

micronutrient Micronutrients are nutrient, essential dietary elements required by organisms in varying quantities throughout life to orchestrate a range of physiological functions to maintain health. Micronutrient requirements differ between organisms; for exam ...

s including

molybdenum Molybdenum is a chemical element with the symbol Mo and atomic number 42 which is located in period 5 and group 6. The name is from Neo-Latin ''molybdaenum'', which is based on Ancient Greek ', meaning lead, since its ores were confused with lea ...

and

manganese Manganese is a chemical element with the symbol Mn and atomic number 25. It is a hard, brittle, silvery metal, often found in minerals in combination with iron. Manganese is a transition metal with a multifaceted array of industrial alloy use ...

St Nicholas, Harpenden, Herts - geograph

Warington also worked with Brenchley on the Rothamste
Classical Experiments
Broadbalk (

winter wheat Winter wheat (usually ''Triticum aestivum'') are strains of wheat that are planted in the autumn to germinate and develop into young plants that remain in the vegetative phase during the winter and resume growth in early spring. Classification ...

study started 1843) and Park Grass (started 1856), where from 1921 they carried out field surveys of weeds. Warington tested the

germination Germination is the process by which an organism grows from a seed or spore. The term is applied to the sprouting of a seedling from a seed of an angiosperm or gymnosperm, the growth of a sporeling from a spore, such as the spores of fungi, fer ...

of weed seeds, demonstrating that most species had an optimal germination period during the year.

Later life

Katherine Warington retired in 1957. She had an active retirement including voluntary clerical work at the

St Nicholas Saint Nicholas of Myra, ; la, Sanctus Nicolaus (traditionally 15 March 270 – 6 December 343), also known as Nicholas of Bari, was an early Christian bishop of Greeks, Greek descent from the maritime city of Myra in Asia Minor (; modern-da ...

' parish office. During her last few years she lived in a residential home in

St Albans St Albans () is a cathedral city in Hertfordshire, England, east of Hemel Hempstead and west of Hatfield, Hertfordshire, Hatfield, north-west of London, south-west of Welwyn Garden City and south-east of Luton. St Albans was the first major ...

where she died on 3 July 1993 following a stroke at the age of 95. She is buried in the family plot in St Nicholas Churchyard. Katherine Warington

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Warington, Katherine 1897 births 1993 deaths British botanists People from Harpenden Alumni of Royal Holloway, University of London Rothamsted Experimental Station people 20th-century British women scientists