Eduard Strasburger

Eduard Adolf Strasburger (1 February 1844 – 18 May 1912) was a Polish-German professor and one of the most famous botanists of the 19th century. He discovered mitosis in plants.

Life

Eduard Strasburger was born in Warsaw, Congress Poland, the son of Anna Karoline (von Schütz) and Eduard Gottlieb Strasburger (1803–1874). In 1870, he married Alexandra Julia ("Alexandrine") Wertheim (1847–1902), they had two children: Anna (1870–1942) and Julius (1871–1934).

Strasburger studied biological sciences in Paris, Bonn and Jena, receiving a PhD in 1866 after working with Nathanael Pringsheim. In 1868 he taught at the University of Warsaw. In 1869 he was appointed professor of botany at the University of Jena. From 1881 he was head of the Botanisches Institut at the University of Bonn.

Strasburger died in Bonn, Germany.

Achievements

Strasburger was a founder of the famous Lehrbuch der Botanik für Hochschulen (Textbook of Botany), which first appeared in 1894. He was the first to provide an accurate description of the embryonic sac in gymnosperms (such as conifers) and angiosperms (flowering plants), along with demonstrating double-fertilization in angiosperms. He came up with one of the modern laws of plant cytology: "New cell nuclei can only arise from the division of other nuclei." and originated the terms cytoplasm and nucleoplasm.

Together with Walther Flemming and Edouard van Beneden, he elucidated chromosome distribution during cell division. His work on the upward movement of tree sap proved that the process was physical and not physiological.