Alexander Braun
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Alexander Braun in 1876
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| Born | 10 May 1805
Regensburg
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| Died | 29 March 1877(1877-03-29) (aged 71) |
| Known for | morphology |
| Scientific career | |
| Fields | botany |
| Institutions | Freiburg Giessen University of Berlin |
| Author abbrev. (botany) | A.Braun |
Alexander Carl Heinrich Braun (10 May 1805 – 29 March 1877) was a German botanist from Regensburg, Bavaria. His research centered on the morphology of plants and was a very influential teacher who worked as a professor of botany at the universities of Freiburg, Giessen, and Berlin at various times. He was also the director of the Berlin Botanical Garden.
Braun was born in Regensburg (Ratisbon) where his father Alexander was a tax inspector in the postal department. His mother Henriette was the daughter of a priest and mathematics professor. He studied at Karlsruhe and Freiburg (Breisgau) where his father was transferred. He went to the University of Heidelberg to study medicine. His teachers included Gottlieb Wilhelm Bischoff, Johann Heinrich Dierbach and Franz Joseph Schelver. At Heidelberg he studied with Louis Agassiz, Carl Schimper and George Engelmann. Agassiz would marry Braun's sister Cecilie while Schimper was engaged briefly to Braun's sister Emilie. He completed his studies at Paris and Munich.[1] In 1833 he began teaching botany at the Polytechnic School of Karlsruhe, staying there until 1846. Afterwards he was a professor of botany in Freiburg (from 1846), Giessen (from 1850) and at the University of Berlin (1851), where he remained until 1877. While in Berlin, he was also director of the botanical garden. He designed the layout which was later documented by Paul Friedrich August Ascherson. In 1852, he was elected a foreign member of the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences. With Gottlob Ludwig Rabenhorst (1806–1881) and Ernst Stizenberger (1827–1895), he was editor of the exsiccata series Die Characeen Europa's in getrockneten Exemplaren, unter Mitwirkung mehrerer Freunde der Botanik, gesammelt und herausgegeben von Prof. A. Braun, L. Rabenhorst und E. Stizenberger.[2][3]
Braun is largely known for his research involving plant morphology. He accepted evolution but was a critic of Darwinism.[4] He was a proponent of vitalism, a popular 19th-century speculative theory that claimed that a regulative force existed within living matter in order to maintain functionality. Braun made important contributions in the field of cell theory. His students included August Wilhelm Eichler.[5][6][7]
From his 1830s analysis of the arrangement of scales on a pine cone he was a pioneer of mathematical phyllotaxis developing what is called the Schimper-Braun theory.[8][9]
In 1877, Wilhelm Philippe Schimper and Philipp Bruch named the plant genus Braunia in his honor.[10] Also, a decorative plant known as "Braun's holly fern" (Polystichum braunii) commemorates his name.[11]
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