Biology and Its Makers: With Portraits and Other IllustrationsLocy, William A. (William Albert)
History
Biology and Its Makers: With Portraits and Other Illustrations
Locy, William A. (William Albert)
Biology -- History
Von Mohl.--In 1846, eleven years after the discovery of Dujardin, the
eminent botanist Hugo von Mohl (1805-1872) designated a particular part
of the living contents of the vegetable cell by the term protoplasma.
The viscid, jelly-like substance in plants had in the mean time
come to be known under the expressive term of plant "_schleim_." He
distinguished the firmer mucilaginous and granular constituent, found
just under the cell membrane, from the watery cell-sap that occupies
the interior of the cell. It was to the former part that he gave the
name protoplasma. Previous to this, the botanist Nägeli had studied
this living substance, and perceived that it was nitrogenous matter.
This was a distinct step in advance of the vague and indefinite idea of
Schleiden, who had in reality noticed protoplasm in 1838, but thought
of it merely as gum. The highly accomplished investigator Nägeli (Fig.
84) made a great place for himself in botanical investigation, and his
name is connected with several fundamental ideas of biology. To Von
Mohl, however, belongs the credit of having brought the word protoplasm
into general use. He stands in the direct line of development, while
Purkinje, who first employed the word protoplasm, stands somewhat
aside, but his name, nevertheless, should be connected with the
establishment of the protoplasm doctrine.
[Illustration: Fig. 85.--Hugo von Mohl, 1805-1872.]
Von Mohl (Fig. 85) was an important man in botany. Early in life he
showed a great love for natural science, and as in his day medical
instruction afforded the best opportunities for a man with scientific
tastes, he entered upon that course of study in Tübingen at the age of
eighteen. He took his degree of doctor of medicine in 1823, and spent
several years in Munich. He became professor of physiology in Bern in
1832, and three years later was transferred to Tübingen as professor of
botany. Here he remained to the end of his life, refusing invitations
to institutions elsewhere. He never married, and, without the cares
and joys of a family, led a solitary and uneventful life, devoted to
botanical investigation.
Cohn.--After Von Mohl's studies on "plant schleim" there was a general
movement toward the conclusion that the sarcode of the zoölogists and
the protoplasm of the botanists were one and the same substance. This
notion was in the minds of more than one worker, but it is perhaps to
Ferdinand Cohn (1828-1898) that the credit should be given for bringing
the question to a head. After a study of the remarkable movements of
the active spores of one of the simplest plants (protococcus), he said
that vegetable protoplasm and animal sarcode, "if not identical, must
be, at any rate, in the highest degree analogous substances" (Geddes).
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