Gregor Johann Mendel
OSA (; cs, Řehoř Jan Mendel;
[Funeral card in Czech (Brno, 6. January 1884)](_blank)
/ref> 20 July 1822 – 6 January 1884) was an Austrian-Czech biologist, meteorologist, mathematician, Augustinian Augustinian may refer to:
*Augustinians, members of religious orders following the Rule of St Augustine
*Augustinianism, the teachings of Augustine of Hippo and his intellectual heirs
*Someone who follows Augustine of Hippo
* Canons Regular of Sain ...
friar
A friar is a member of one of the mendicant orders founded in the twelfth or thirteenth century; the term distinguishes the mendicants' itinerant apostolic character, exercised broadly under the jurisdiction of a superior general, from the ol ...
and abbot
Abbot is an ecclesiastical title given to the male head of a monastery in various Western religious traditions, including Christianity. The office may also be given as an honorary title to a clergyman who is not the head of a monastery. The fem ...
of St. Thomas' Abbey in Brno
Brno ( , ; german: Brünn ) is a city in the South Moravian Region of the Czech Republic. Located at the confluence of the Svitava and Svratka rivers, Brno has about 380,000 inhabitants, making it the second-largest city in the Czech Republic ...
(Brünn), Margraviate of Moravia
The Margraviate of Moravia ( cs, Markrabství moravské; german: Markgrafschaft Mähren) was one of the Lands of the Bohemian Crown within the Holy Roman Empire existing from 1182 to 1918. It was officially administrated by a margrave in cooperat ...
. Mendel was born in a German-speaking
German ( ) is a West Germanic language mainly spoken in Central Europe. It is the most widely spoken and official or co-official language in Germany, Austria, Switzerland, Liechtenstein, and the Italian province of South Tyrol. It is also a ...
family in the Silesian part of the Austrian Empire
The Austrian Empire (german: link=no, Kaiserthum Oesterreich, modern spelling , ) was a Central-Eastern European multinational great power from 1804 to 1867, created by proclamation out of the realms of the Habsburgs. During its existence, ...
(today's Czech Republic
The Czech Republic, or simply Czechia, is a landlocked country in Central Europe. Historically known as Bohemia, it is bordered by Austria to the south, Germany to the west, Poland to the northeast, and Slovakia to the southeast. The ...
) and gained posthumous recognition as the founder of the modern science of genetics
Genetics is the study of genes, genetic variation, and heredity in organisms.Hartl D, Jones E (2005) It is an important branch in biology because heredity is vital to organisms' evolution. Gregor Mendel, a Moravian Augustinian friar wor ...
. Though farmers had known for millennia that crossbreeding of animals and plants could favor certain desirable traits, Mendel's pea
The pea is most commonly the small spherical seed or the seed-pod of the flowering plant species ''Pisum sativum''. Each pod contains several peas, which can be green or yellow. Botanically, pea pods are fruit, since they contain seeds and d ...
plant experiments conducted between 1856 and 1863 established many of the rules of heredity
Heredity, also called inheritance or biological inheritance, is the passing on of traits from parents to their offspring; either through asexual reproduction or sexual reproduction, the offspring cells or organisms acquire the genetic inform ...
, now referred to as the laws of Mendelian inheritance
Mendelian inheritance (also known as Mendelism) is a type of biological inheritance following the principles originally proposed by Gregor Mendel in 1865 and 1866, re-discovered in 1900 by Hugo de Vries and Carl Correns, and later popularize ...
.
Mendel worked with seven characteristics of pea plants: plant height, pod shape and color, seed shape and color, and flower position and color. Taking seed color as an example, Mendel showed that when a true-breeding yellow pea and a true-breeding green pea were cross-bred their offspring always produced yellow seeds. However, in the next generation, the green peas reappeared at a ratio of 1 green to 3 yellow. To explain this phenomenon, Mendel coined the terms "recessive
In genetics, dominance is the phenomenon of one variant (allele) of a gene on a chromosome masking or overriding the effect of a different variant of the same gene on the other copy of the chromosome. The first variant is termed dominant and t ...
" and " dominant" in reference to certain traits. In the preceding example, the green trait, which seems to have vanished in the first filial generation, is recessive and the yellow is dominant. He published his work in 1866, demonstrating the actions of invisible "factors"—now called gene
In biology, the word gene (from , ; "...Wilhelm Johannsen coined the word gene to describe the Mendelian units of heredity..." meaning ''generation'' or ''birth'' or ''gender'') can have several different meanings. The Mendelian gene is a ba ...
s—in predictably determining the traits of an organism.
The profound significance of Mendel's work was not recognized until the turn of the 20th century (more than three decades later) with the rediscovery of his laws. Erich von Tschermak Erich Tschermak, Edler von Seysenegg (15 November 1871 – 11 October 1962) was an Austrian agronomist who developed several new disease-resistant crops, including wheat-rye and oat hybrids. He was a son of the Moravia-born mineralogist Gustav ...
, Hugo de Vries
Hugo Marie de Vries () (16 February 1848 – 21 May 1935) was a Dutch botanist and one of the first geneticists. He is known chiefly for suggesting the concept of genes, rediscovering the laws of heredity in the 1890s while apparently unaware of ...
and Carl Correns
Carl Erich Correns (19 September 1864 – 14 February 1933) was a German botanist and geneticist notable primarily for his independent discovery of the principles of heredity, which he achieved simultaneously but independently of the botanist ...
independently verified several of Mendel's experimental findings in 1900, ushering in the modern age of genetics.
Early life and education
Mendel was born into a German-speaking
German ( ) is a West Germanic language mainly spoken in Central Europe. It is the most widely spoken and official or co-official language in Germany, Austria, Switzerland, Liechtenstein, and the Italian province of South Tyrol. It is also a ...
family in Heinzendorf bei Odrau Heinzendorf may refer to:
Places
* Hynčice (german: Heinzendorf bei Halbstadt), municipality in the Okres Náchod, Czech Republic
* Jasienica (''Heinzendorf, Kreis Teschen''), municipality in the Powiat Bielski, Poland
* Vítějeves (''Hein ...
, in Silesia
Silesia (, also , ) is a historical region of Central Europe that lies mostly within Poland, with small parts in the Czech Republic and Germany. Its area is approximately , and the population is estimated at around 8,000,000. Silesia is split ...
, Austrian Empire
The Austrian Empire (german: link=no, Kaiserthum Oesterreich, modern spelling , ) was a Central-Eastern European multinational great power from 1804 to 1867, created by proclamation out of the realms of the Habsburgs. During its existence, ...
(now Hynčice in the Czech Republic
The Czech Republic, or simply Czechia, is a landlocked country in Central Europe. Historically known as Bohemia, it is bordered by Austria to the south, Germany to the west, Poland to the northeast, and Slovakia to the southeast. The ...
). He was the son of Anton and Rosine (Schwirtlich) Mendel and had one older sister, Veronika, and one younger, Theresia. They lived and worked on a farm which had been owned by the Mendel family for at least 130 years (the house where Mendel was born is now a museum devoted to Mendel). During his childhood, Mendel worked as a gardener and studied beekeeping
Beekeeping (or apiculture) is the maintenance of bee colonies, commonly in man-made beehives. Honey bees in the genus '' Apis'' are the most-commonly-kept species but other honey-producing bees such as ''Melipona'' stingless bees are also kept. ...
. As a young man, he attended gymnasium in Troppau
Opava (; german: Troppau, pl, Opawa) is a city in the Moravian-Silesian Region of the Czech Republic. It has about 55,000 inhabitants. It lies on the river Opava. Opava is one of the historical centres of Silesia. It was a historical capital of ...
( cs, Opava). He had to take four months off during his gymnasium studies due to illness. From 1840 to 1843, he studied practical and theoretical philosophy and physics at the Philosophical Institute of the University of Olomouc
A university () is an institution of higher (or tertiary) education and research which awards academic degrees in several academic disciplines. Universities typically offer both undergraduate and postgraduate programs. In the United States, the ...
(german: Olmütz), taking another year off because of illness. He also struggled financially to pay for his studies, and Theresia gave him her dowry. Later he helped support her three sons, two of whom became doctors.
He became a monk in part because it enabled him to obtain an education without having to pay for it himself. As the son of a struggling farmer, the monastic life, in his words, spared him the "perpetual anxiety about a means of livelihood." Born Johann Mendel, he was given the name "Gregor" ( in Czech) when he joined the Order of Saint Augustine
The Order of Saint Augustine, ( la, Ordo Fratrum Sancti Augustini) abbreviated OSA, is a religious mendicant order of the Catholic Church. It was founded in 1244 by bringing together several eremitical groups in the Tuscany region who were fo ...
.
Academic career
When Mendel entered the Faculty of Philosophy, the Department of Natural History and Agriculture was headed by Johann Karl Nestler
Johann Karl Nestler, cs, Jan Karel Nestler (16 December 1783 – 9 July 1842) was an Austrian scientist in the field of hereditary traits, professor of natural history and agriculture at the Philosophical Faculty of University of Olomouc, dean ...
who conducted extensive research of hereditary traits of plants and animals, especially sheep. Upon recommendation of his physics
Physics is the natural science that studies matter, its fundamental constituents, its motion and behavior through space and time, and the related entities of energy and force. "Physical science is that department of knowledge which r ...
teacher Friedrich Franz
Friedrich Franz, cs, Bedřich Franz, (1 December 1783 – 4 December 1860) was a professor of physics and applied mathematics at the Faculty of Philosophy of University of Olomouc, who greatly influenced his student Gregor Johann Mendel, later ...
, Mendel entered the Augustinian Augustinian may refer to:
*Augustinians, members of religious orders following the Rule of St Augustine
*Augustinianism, the teachings of Augustine of Hippo and his intellectual heirs
*Someone who follows Augustine of Hippo
* Canons Regular of Sain ...
St Thomas's Abbey in Brno
Brno ( , ; german: Brünn ) is a city in the South Moravian Region of the Czech Republic. Located at the confluence of the Svitava and Svratka rivers, Brno has about 380,000 inhabitants, making it the second-largest city in the Czech Republic ...
and began his training as a priest. Mendel worked as a substitute high school teacher. In 1850, he failed the oral part, the last of three parts, of his exams to become a certified high school teacher. In 1851, he was sent to the University of Vienna
The University of Vienna (german: Universität Wien) is a public research university located in Vienna, Austria. It was founded by Duke Rudolph IV in 1365 and is the oldest university in the German-speaking world. With its long and rich histor ...
to study under the sponsorship of Abbot
Abbot is an ecclesiastical title given to the male head of a monastery in various Western religious traditions, including Christianity. The office may also be given as an honorary title to a clergyman who is not the head of a monastery. The fem ...
Cyril František Napp so that he could get more formal education. At Vienna, his professor of physics was Christian Doppler
Christian Andreas Doppler ( (); 29 November 1803 – 17 March 1853) was an Austrian mathematician and physicist. He is celebrated for his principle – known as the Doppler effect – that the observed frequency of a wave depends on the relative ...
. Mendel returned to his abbey in 1853 as a teacher, principally of physics. In 1854 he met Aleksander Zawadzki
Aleksander Zawadzki, alias Kazik, Wacek, Bronek, One (; 16 December 1899 – 7 August 1964) was a Polish communist politician, first Chairman of the Council of State of the People's Republic of Poland, divisional general of the Polish Army ...
who encouraged his research in Brno. In 1856, he took the exam to become a certified teacher and again failed the oral part. In 1867, he replaced Napp as abbot of the monastery.
After he was elevated as abbot in 1868, his scientific work largely ended, as Mendel became overburdened with administrative responsibilities, especially a dispute with the civil government over its attempt to impose special taxes on religious institutions. Mendel died on 6 January 1884, at the age of 61, in Brno
Brno ( , ; german: Brünn ) is a city in the South Moravian Region of the Czech Republic. Located at the confluence of the Svitava and Svratka rivers, Brno has about 380,000 inhabitants, making it the second-largest city in the Czech Republic ...
, from chronic nephritis
Nephritis is inflammation of the kidneys and may involve the glomeruli, tubules, or interstitial tissue surrounding the glomeruli and tubules. It is one of several different types of nephropathy.
Types
* Glomerulonephritis is inflammation of th ...
. Czech composer Leoš Janáček
Leoš Janáček (, baptised Leo Eugen Janáček; 3 July 1854 – 12 August 1928) was a Czech composer, musical theorist, folklorist, publicist, and teacher. He was inspired by Moravian and other Slavic musics, including Eastern European fol ...
played the organ at his funeral. After his death, the succeeding abbot burned all papers in Mendel's collection, to mark an end to the disputes over taxation. The exhumation
Burial, also known as interment or inhumation, is a method of final disposition whereby a dead body is placed into the ground, sometimes with objects. This is usually accomplished by excavating a pit or trench, placing the deceased and objec ...
of Mendel's corpse in 2021 delivered some physiognomic
Physiognomy (from the Greek , , meaning "nature", and , meaning "judge" or "interpreter") is the practice of assessing a person's character or personality from their outer appearance—especially the face. The term can also refer to the general ...
details like body height (). His genome was analysed, revealing that Mendel was predisposed to heart problems.
Contributions
Experiments on plant hybridization
Mendel, known as the "father of modern genetics", chose to study variation in plants in his monastery's experimental garden. Mendel was assisted in his experimental design by Aleksander Zawadzki while his superior abbot Napp wrote to discourage him, saying that the Bishop giggled when informed of the detailed genealogies of peas.
After initial experiments with pea plants, Mendel settled on studying seven traits that seemed to be inherited independently of other traits: seed shape, flower color, seed coat tint, pod shape, unripe pod color, flower location, and plant height. He first focused on seed shape, which was either angular or round. Between 1856 and 1863 Mendel cultivated and tested some 28,000 plants, the majority of which were pea
The pea is most commonly the small spherical seed or the seed-pod of the flowering plant species ''Pisum sativum''. Each pod contains several peas, which can be green or yellow. Botanically, pea pods are fruit, since they contain seeds and d ...
plants (''Pisum sativum
The pea is most commonly the small spherical seed or the seed-pod of the flowering plant species ''Pisum sativum''. Each pod contains several peas, which can be green or yellow. Botanically, pea pods are fruit, since they contain seeds and d ...
''). This study showed that, when true-breeding different varieties were crossed to each other (e.g., tall plants fertilized by short plants), in the second generation, one in four pea plants had purebred
Purebreds are "cultivated varieties" of an animal species achieved through the process of selective breeding. When the lineage of a purebred animal is recorded, that animal is said to be "pedigreed". Purebreds breed true-to-type which means the p ...
recessive
In genetics, dominance is the phenomenon of one variant (allele) of a gene on a chromosome masking or overriding the effect of a different variant of the same gene on the other copy of the chromosome. The first variant is termed dominant and t ...
traits, two out of four were hybrids, and one out of four were purebred dominant. His experiments led him to make two generalizations, the Law of Segregation
Mendelian inheritance (also known as Mendelism) is a type of biological inheritance following the principles originally proposed by Gregor Mendel in 1865 and 1866, re-discovered in 1900 by Hugo de Vries and Carl Correns, and later popularized ...
and the Law of Independent Assortment
Mendelian inheritance (also known as Mendelism) is a type of biological inheritance following the principles originally proposed by Gregor Mendel in 1865 and 1866, re-discovered in 1900 by Hugo de Vries and Carl Correns, and later popularized ...
, which later came to be known as Mendel's Laws of Inheritance.
Initial reception of Mendel's work
Mendel presented his paper, ("Experiments on Plant Hybridization
"Experiments on Plant Hybridization" (German: "Versuche über Pflanzen-Hybriden") is a seminal paper written in 1865 and published in 1866 by Gregor Mendel, an Augustinian friar considered to be the founder of modern genetics. The paper was the r ...
"), at two meetings of the Natural History Society of Brno in Moravia
Moravia ( , also , ; cs, Morava ; german: link=yes, Mähren ; pl, Morawy ; szl, Morawa; la, Moravia) is a historical region in the east of the Czech Republic and one of three historical Czech lands, with Bohemia and Czech Silesia.
The me ...
on 8 February and 8 March 1865. It generated a few favorable reports in local newspapers, but was ignored by the scientific community. When Mendel's paper was published in 1866 in , it was seen as essentially about hybridization rather than inheritance, had little impact, and was cited only about three times over the next thirty-five years. His paper was criticized at the time, but is now considered a seminal work. Notably, Charles Darwin
Charles Robert Darwin ( ; 12 February 1809 – 19 April 1882) was an English naturalist, geologist, and biologist, widely known for his contributions to evolutionary biology. His proposition that all species of life have descended fr ...
was not aware of Mendel's paper, and it is envisaged that if he had been aware of it, genetics as it exists now might have taken hold much earlier. Mendel's scientific biography thus provides an example of the failure of obscure, highly original innovators to receive the attention they deserve.
Rediscovery of Mendel's work
About forty scientists listened to Mendel's two groundbreaking lectures, but it would appear that they failed to understand the implications of his work. Later, he also carried on a correspondence with Carl Nägeli
Carl Wilhelm von Nägeli (26 or 27 March 1817 – 10 May 1891) was a Swiss people, Swiss botany, botanist. He studied cell division and pollination but became known as the man who discouraged Gregor Mendel from further work on genetics. He reje ...
, one of the leading biologists of the time, but Nägeli too failed to appreciate Mendel's discoveries. At times, Mendel must have entertained doubts about his work, but not always: "My time will come," he reportedly told a friend, Gustav von Niessl.
During Mendel's lifetime, most biologists held the idea that all characteristics were passed to the next generation through blending inheritance
Blending may refer to:
* The process of mixing in process engineering
* Mixing paints to achieve a greater range of colors
* Blending (alcohol production), a technique to produce alcoholic beverages by mixing different brews
* Blending (linguist ...
(indeed, many effectively are), in which the traits from each parent are averaged. Instances of this phenomenon are now explained by the action of multiple genes with quantitative effects. Charles Darwin tried unsuccessfully to explain inheritance through a theory of pangenesis
Pangenesis was Charles Darwin's hypothetical mechanism for heredity, in which he proposed that each part of the body continually emitted its own type of small organic particles called gemmules that aggregated in the gonads, contributing herita ...
. It was not until the early 20th century that the importance of Mendel's ideas was realized.
By 1900, research aimed at finding a successful theory of discontinuous inheritance rather than blending inheritance
Blending may refer to:
* The process of mixing in process engineering
* Mixing paints to achieve a greater range of colors
* Blending (alcohol production), a technique to produce alcoholic beverages by mixing different brews
* Blending (linguist ...
led to independent duplication of his work by Hugo de Vries
Hugo Marie de Vries () (16 February 1848 – 21 May 1935) was a Dutch botanist and one of the first geneticists. He is known chiefly for suggesting the concept of genes, rediscovering the laws of heredity in the 1890s while apparently unaware of ...
and Carl Correns
Carl Erich Correns (19 September 1864 – 14 February 1933) was a German botanist and geneticist notable primarily for his independent discovery of the principles of heredity, which he achieved simultaneously but independently of the botanist ...
, and the rediscovery of Mendel's writings and laws. Both acknowledged Mendel's priority, and it is thought probable that de Vries did not understand the results he had found until after reading Mendel. Though Erich von Tschermak Erich Tschermak, Edler von Seysenegg (15 November 1871 – 11 October 1962) was an Austrian agronomist who developed several new disease-resistant crops, including wheat-rye and oat hybrids. He was a son of the Moravia-born mineralogist Gustav ...
was originally also credited with rediscovery, this is no longer accepted because he did not understand Mendel's laws
Mendelian inheritance (also known as Mendelism) is a type of biological inheritance following the principles originally proposed by Gregor Mendel in 1865 and 1866, re-discovered in 1900 by Hugo de Vries and Carl Correns, and later popularize ...
. Though de Vries later lost interest in Mendelism, other biologists started to establish modern genetics as a science. All three of these researchers, each from a different country, published their rediscovery of Mendel's work within a two-month span in the spring of 1900.
Mendel's results were quickly replicated, and genetic linkage quickly worked out. Biologists flocked to the theory; even though it was not yet applicable to many phenomena, it sought to give a genotypic
The genotype of an organism is its complete set of genetic material. Genotype can also be used to refer to the alleles or variants an individual carries in a particular gene or genetic location. The number of alleles an individual can have in a ...
understanding of heredity which they felt was lacking in previous studies of heredity, which had focused on phenotypic
In genetics, the phenotype () is the set of observable characteristics or traits of an organism. The term covers the organism's morphology or physical form and structure, its developmental processes, its biochemical and physiological proper ...
approaches. Most prominent of these previous approaches was the biometric
Biometrics are body measurements and calculations related to human characteristics. Biometric authentication (or realistic authentication) is used in computer science as a form of identification and access control. It is also used to identify in ...
school of Karl Pearson
Karl Pearson (; born Carl Pearson; 27 March 1857 – 27 April 1936) was an English mathematician and biostatistician. He has been credited with establishing the discipline of mathematical statistics. He founded the world's first university st ...
and W. F. R. Weldon, which was based heavily on statistical studies of phenotype variation. The strongest opposition to this school came from William Bateson
William Bateson (8 August 1861 – 8 February 1926) was an English biologist who was the first person to use the term genetics to describe the study of heredity, and the chief populariser of the ideas of Gregor Mendel following their rediscove ...
, who perhaps did the most in the early days of publicising the benefits of Mendel's theory (the word "genetics
Genetics is the study of genes, genetic variation, and heredity in organisms.Hartl D, Jones E (2005) It is an important branch in biology because heredity is vital to organisms' evolution. Gregor Mendel, a Moravian Augustinian friar wor ...
", and much of the discipline's other terminology, originated with Bateson). This debate between the biometricians and the Mendelians was extremely vigorous in the first two decades of the 20th century, with the biometricians claiming statistical and mathematical rigor, whereas the Mendelians claimed a better understanding of biology. Modern genetics shows that Mendelian heredity is in fact an inherently biological process, though not all genes of Mendel's experiments are yet understood.
In the end, the two approaches were combined, especially by work conducted by R. A. Fisher
Sir Ronald Aylmer Fisher (17 February 1890 – 29 July 1962) was a British polymath who was active as a mathematician, statistician, biologist, geneticist, and academic. For his work in statistics, he has been described as "a genius who ...
as early as 1918. The combination, in the 1930s and 1940s, of Mendelian genetics with Darwin's theory of natural selection
Natural selection is the differential survival and reproduction of individuals due to differences in phenotype. It is a key mechanism of evolution, the change in the heritable traits characteristic of a population over generations. Charle ...
resulted in the modern synthesis
Modern synthesis or modern evolutionary synthesis refers to several perspectives on evolutionary biology, namely:
* Modern synthesis (20th century), the term coined by Julian Huxley in 1942 to denote the synthesis between Mendelian genetics and s ...
of evolutionary biology
Evolutionary biology is the subfield of biology that studies the evolutionary processes (natural selection, common descent, speciation) that produced the diversity of life on Earth. It is also defined as the study of the history of life fo ...
.
In the Soviet Union
The Soviet Union,. officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR),. was a transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 to 1991. A flagship communist state, it was nominally a federal union of fifteen national ...
and China, Mendelian genetics was rejected in favor of Lamarckism
Lamarckism, also known as Lamarckian inheritance or neo-Lamarckism, is the notion that an organism can pass on to its offspring physical characteristics that the parent organism acquired through use or disuse during its lifetime. It is also calle ...
, leading to imprisonment and even execution of Mendelian geneticists (see Lysenkoism
Lysenkoism (russian: Лысенковщина, Lysenkovshchina, ; uk, лисенківщина, lysenkivščyna, ) was a political campaign led by Soviet biologist Trofim Lysenko against genetics and science-based agriculture in the mid-20th cen ...
).
Other experiments
Mendel began his studies on heredity using mice. He was at St. Thomas's Abbey but his bishop did not like one of his friars studying animal sex, so Mendel switched to plants. Mendel also bred bees in a bee house that was built for him, using bee hive
A beehive is an enclosed structure in which some honey bee species of the subgenus '' Apis'' live and raise their young. Though the word ''beehive'' is commonly used to describe the nest of any bee colony, scientific and professional literature ...
s that he designed. He also studied astronomy
Astronomy () is a natural science that studies astronomical object, celestial objects and phenomena. It uses mathematics, physics, and chemistry in order to explain their origin and chronology of the Universe, evolution. Objects of interest ...
and meteorology
Meteorology is a branch of the atmospheric sciences (which include atmospheric chemistry and physics) with a major focus on weather forecasting. The study of meteorology dates back millennia, though significant progress in meteorology did not ...
, founding the 'Austrian Meteorological Society' in 1865. The majority of his published works were related to meteorology.
Mendel also experimented with hawkweed
''Hieracium'' (),
known by the common name hawkweed and classically as (from ancient Greek ιεράξ, 'hawk'),
is a genus of flowering plant in the family Asteraceae, and closely related to dandelion (''Taraxacum''), chicory ('' Cichorium'') ...
(''Hieracium'') and honeybees
A honey bee (also spelled honeybee) is a eusocial flying insect within the genus ''Apis'' of the bee clade, all native to Afro-Eurasia. After bees spread naturally throughout Africa and Eurasia, humans became responsible for the current cosmo ...
. He published a report on his work with hawkweed, a group of plants of great interest to scientists at the time because of their diversity. However, the results of Mendel's inheritance study in hawkweeds was unlike his results for peas; the first generation was very variable and many of their offspring were identical to the maternal parent. In his correspondence with Carl Nägeli
Carl Wilhelm von Nägeli (26 or 27 March 1817 – 10 May 1891) was a Swiss people, Swiss botany, botanist. He studied cell division and pollination but became known as the man who discouraged Gregor Mendel from further work on genetics. He reje ...
he discussed his results but was unable to explain them. It was not appreciated until the end of the nineteenth century that many hawkweed species were apomictic
In botany, apomixis is asexual reproduction without fertilization. Its etymology is Greek for "away from" + "mixing". This definition notably does not mention meiosis. Thus "normal asexual reproduction" of plants, such as propagation from cuttin ...
, producing most of their seeds through an asexual process.
None of his results on bees survived, except for a passing mention in the reports of Moravian Apiculture Society. All that is known definitely is that he used Cyprian and Carniolan bees, which were particularly aggressive to the annoyance of other monks and visitors of the monastery such that he was asked to get rid of them. Mendel, on the other hand, was fond of his bees, and referred to them as "my dearest little animals".
He also described novel plant species
In biology, a species is the basic unit of classification and a taxonomic rank of an organism, as well as a unit of biodiversity. A species is often defined as the largest group of organisms in which any two individuals of the appropriate s ...
, and these are denoted with the botanical author abbreviation
In botanical nomenclature, author citation is the way of citing the person or group of people who validly published a botanical name, i.e. who first published the name while fulfilling the formal requirements as specified by the ''International Cod ...
"Mendel".
Mendelian paradox
In 1936, Ronald Fisher
Sir Ronald Aylmer Fisher (17 February 1890 – 29 July 1962) was a British polymath who was active as a mathematician, statistician, biologist, geneticist, and academic. For his work in statistics, he has been described as "a genius who a ...
, a prominent statistician and population geneticist, reconstructed Mendel's experiments, analyzed results from the F2 (second filial) generation and found the ratio of dominant to recessive phenotypes (e.g. yellow versus green peas; round versus wrinkled peas) to be implausibly and consistently too close to the expected ratio of 3 to 1. Fisher asserted that "the data of most, if not all, of the experiments have been falsified so as to agree closely with Mendel's expectations". Mendel's alleged observations, according to Fisher, were "abominable", "shocking", and "cooked".
Other scholars agree with Fisher that Mendel's various observations come uncomfortably close to Mendel's expectations. A. W. F. Edwards
Anthony William Fairbank Edwards, FRS (born 1935) is a British statistician, geneticist and evolutionary biologist. He is the son of the surgeon Harold C. Edwards, and brother of medical geneticist John H. Edwards. He has sometimes been called ...
, for instance, remarks: "One can applaud the lucky gambler; but when he is lucky again tomorrow, and the next day, and the following day, one is entitled to become a little suspicious". Three other lines of evidence likewise lend support to the assertion that Mendel's results are indeed too good to be true.
Fisher's analysis gave rise to the Mendelian paradox: Mendel's reported data are, statistically speaking, too good to be true, yet "everything we know about Mendel suggests that he was unlikely to engage in either deliberate fraud or in unconscious adjustment of his observations". A number of writers have attempted to resolve this paradox.
One attempted explanation invokes confirmation bias
Confirmation bias is the tendency to search for, interpret, favor, and recall information in a way that confirms or supports one's prior beliefs or values. People display this bias when they select information that supports their views, ignoring ...
. Fisher accused Mendel's experiments as "biased strongly in the direction of agreement with expectation ..to give the theory the benefit of doubt". In a 2004 article, J.W. Porteous concluded that Mendel's observations were indeed implausible. An explanation for Mendel's results based on tetrad
Tetrad ('group of 4') or tetrade may refer to:
* Tetrad (area), an area 2 km x 2 km square
* Tetrad (astronomy), four total lunar eclipses within two years
* Tetrad (chromosomal formation)
* Tetrad (general relativity), or frame field
** Tetrad fo ...
pollen has been proposed, but reproduction of the experiments showed no evidence that the tetrad-pollen model explains any of the bias.
Another attempt to resolve the Mendelian paradox notes that a conflict may sometimes arise between the moral imperative of a bias-free recounting of one's factual observations and the even more important imperative of advancing scientific knowledge. Mendel might have felt compelled "to simplify his data in order to meet real, or feared, editorial objections". Such an action could be justified on moral grounds (and hence provide a resolution to the Mendelian paradox), since the alternative—refusing to comply—might have retarded the growth of scientific knowledge. Similarly, like so many other obscure innovators of science, Mendel, a little known innovator of working-class background, had to "break through the cognitive paradigms and social prejudices" of his audience. If such a breakthrough "could be best achieved by deliberately omitting some observations from his report and adjusting others to make them more palatable to his audience, such actions could be justified on moral grounds".
Daniel L. Hartl and Daniel J. Fairbanks reject outright Fisher's statistical argument, suggesting that Fisher incorrectly interpreted Mendel's experiments. They find it likely that Mendel scored more than 10 progeny, and that the results matched the expectation. They conclude: "Fisher's allegation of deliberate falsification can finally be put to rest, because on closer analysis it has proved to be unsupported by convincing evidence". In 2008 Hartl and Fairbanks (with Allan Franklin and AWF Edwards) wrote a comprehensive book in which they concluded that there were no reasons to assert Mendel fabricated his results, nor that Fisher deliberately tried to diminish Mendel's legacy. Reassessment of Fisher's statistical analysis, according to these authors, also disproves the notion of confirmation bias in Mendel's results.
Commemoration
Mount Mendel in New Zealand's Paparoa Range
The Paparoa Range is a mountain range in the West Coast Region, West Coast region of New Zealand's South Island. It was the first New Zealand land seen by a European – Abel Tasman in 1642. Part of the range has the country's highest protection ...
was named after him in 1970 by the Department of Scientific and Industrial Research Department of Scientific and Industrial Research, abbreviated DSIR was the name of several British Empire organisations founded after the 1923 Imperial Conference to foster intra-Empire trade and development.
* Department of Scientific and Industria ...
. In celebration of his 200th birthday, Mendel's body was exhumed and his DNA sequenced.Why scientists dug up the father of genetics, Gregor Mendel, and analyzed his DNA
/ref>
See also
* List of Roman Catholic cleric–scientists
This is a list of Catholic clergy throughout history who have made contributions to science. These churchmen-scientists include Nicolaus Copernicus, Gregor Mendel, Georges Lemaître, Albertus Magnus, Roger Bacon, Pierre Gassendi, Roger Joseph Bo ...
* Mendel Museum of Genetics
* Mendel Polar Station
Mendel Polar Station is a Czech research station in Antarctica on the coast of James Ross Island. It was founded by a Czech polar explorer Pavel Prošek. The official opening ceremony took place in February 2007 and made the Czech Republic the ...
in Antarctica
* Mendel University in Brno
* Mendelian error
A Mendelian error in the genetic analysis of a species, describes an allele in an individual which could not have been received from either of its biological parents by Mendelian inheritance. Inheritance is defined by a set of related individual ...
* ''The Gardener of God
''The Gardener of God'' is a 2010 Italian drama film written and directed by Liana Marabini in 2010, about the life and works of Gregor Mendel, a Catholic priest who lived in the Austro-Hungarian Empire. The main role is played by Christopher La ...
'', an Italian docudrama about the life and works of Gregor Mendel
References
Further reading
* William Bateson
William Bateson (8 August 1861 – 8 February 1926) was an English biologist who was the first person to use the term genetics to describe the study of heredity, and the chief populariser of the ideas of Gregor Mendel following their rediscove ...
On-line Facsimile Edition: Electronic Scholarly Publishing, Prepared by Robert Robbins
* Hugo Iltis
Hugo Iltis (April 11, 1882 – June 22, 1952) was a Czech-American biologist.
Life and work
Iltis was born on April 11, 1882, in Brno, Moravia, Austria-Hungary. His family was of Jewish descent, and the family name translates as "polecat". He wa ...
, ''Gregor Johann Mendel. Leben, Werk und Wirkung''. Berlin: J. Springer. 426 pages. (1924)
**Translated by Eden and Cedar Paul Cedar Paul, ''née'' Gertrude Mary Davenport (1880 – 18 March 1972) was a singer, author, translator and journalist.''Who Was Who''
Biography
Gertrude Davenport came from a musical family: she was the granddaughter of the composer George Alex ...
as ''Life of Mendel''. New York: W. W. Norton & Co, 1932. 336 pages. New York: Hafner, 1966: London: George Allen & Unwin, 1966. Ann Arbor: University Microfilms International, 1976.
**Translated by Zhenyao Tan as ''Mên-tê-êrh chuan''. Shanghai: Shang wu yin shu guan, 1924. 2 vols. in 1, 661 pp. Shanghai: Shang wu yin shu guan, Minguo 25 936
Year 936 ( CMXXXVI) was a leap year starting on Friday (link will display the full calendar) of the Julian calendar.
Events
By place
Europe
* June 19 – At Laon, Louis IV, the 14-year old son of the late King Charles the Simple, ...
**Translated as ''Zasshu shokubutsu no kenkyū. Tsuketari Menderu shōden''. Tōkyō: Iwanami Shoten, Shōwa 3 928
Year 928 ( CMXXVIII) was a leap year starting on Tuesday (link will display the full calendar) of the Julian calendar.
Events
By place
Europe
* King Rudolph I loses the support of Herbert II, count of Vermandois, who controls the pr ...
100 pp. Translated by Yuzuru Nagashima as ''Menderu no shōgai''. Tōkyō: Sōgensha, Shōwa 17 942
Year 942 ( CMXLII) was a common year starting on Saturday (link will display the full calendar) of the Julian calendar.
Events
By place
Europe
* Summer – The Hungarians invade Al-Andalus (modern Spain) and besiege the fortress ...
''Menderu den''. Tōkyō: Tōkyō Sōgensha, 1960.
*
* Robert Lock, ''Recent Progress in the Study of Variation, Heredity and Evolution'', London, 1906
*
* (1st Pub. 1905)
* Curt Stern
Curt Stern (August 30, 1902 – October 23, 1981) was a German-born American geneticist.
Life
Curt Jacob Stern was born into a middle-class Jewish family in Hamburg, Germany on August 30, 1902. He was the first son of Earned S. Stern, born ...
and Sherwood ER (1966) ''The Origin of Genetics''.
*
*
* refutes allegations about "data smoothing"
* James Walsh, ''Catholic Churchmen in Science'', Philadelphia: Dolphin Press, 1906
*
*
External links
*
*
*
1913 Catholic Encyclopedia entry, "Mendel, Mendelism"
Augustinian Abbey of St. Thomas at Brno
Biography, bibliography and access to digital sources
in the Virtual Laboratory The online project Virtual Laboratory. Essays and Resources on the Experimentalization of Life, 1830-1930, located at the Max Planck Institute for the History of Science, is dedicated to research in the history of the experimentalization of life. Th ...
of the Max Planck Institute for the History of Science
The Max Planck Institute for the History of Science (German: Max-Planck-Institut für Wissenschaftsgeschichte) is a scientific research institute founded in March 1994. It is dedicated to addressing fundamental questions of the history of knowledg ...
Biography of Gregor Mendel
GCSE student
Gregor Mendel Primary Sources
* Brno Now
Mendel Museum of Genetics
Online Mendelian Inheritance in Man
{{DEFAULTSORT:Mendel, Gregor
1822 births
1884 deaths
People from Nový Jičín District
People from Austrian Silesia
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Czech Roman Catholics
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Austrian abbots
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19th-century Austrian botanists
Botanists with author abbreviations
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