Ecological

Early beginnings

Ecological concepts such as food chains, population regulation, and productivity were developed in the 1700s, through the works of microscopist Antonie van Leeuwenhoek (1632–1723) and botanist Richard Bradley (1688?–1732). Biogeographer Alexander von Humboldt (1769–1859) recognized ecological gradients, where species are replaced or altered in form along environmental gradients. Humboldt drew inspiration from Isaac Newton, as he developed a form of "terrestrial physics". Natural historians, such as Humboldt, James Hutton, and Jean-Baptiste Lamarck laid the foundations of ecology. The term "ecology" (German: Oekologie, Ökologie) was coined by Ernst Haeckel in his book Generelle Morphologie der Organismen (1866). Haeckel was a zoologist, artist, writer, and later in life a professor of comparative anatomy.