Background

Ethnicity: He was born in modern Czech to a German speaking parents.

Mendel was born on July 20, 1822, into a German-speaking family in Hynčice (Heinzendorf bei Odrau in German), at the Moravian-Silesian border, Austrian Empire (now a part of the Czech Republic). 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).

Education

During his childhood, Mendel worked as a gardener and studied beekeeping. As a young man, he attended gymnasium in Opava (called Troppau in German). 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, 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 friar 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." When Mendel entered the Faculty of Philosophy, the Department of Natural History and Agriculture was headed by Johann Karl Nestler who conducted extensive research of hereditary traits of plants and animals, especially sheep. Upon recommendation of his physics teacher Friedrich Franz, Mendel entered the Augustinian St Thomas's Abbey in Brno (called Brünn in German) and began his training as a priest. Born Johann Mendel, he took the name Gregor upon entering religious life. 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 to study under the sponsorship of Abbot C. F. Napp so that he could get more formal education. At Vienna, his professor of physics was Christian Doppler. Mendel returned to his abbey in 1853 as a teacher, principally of physics. 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.

Career

In the summer of 1853, Mendel returned to the monastery in Brünn, and in the following year he was again given a teaching position, this time at the Brünn Realschule (secondary school), where he remained until elected abbot 14 years later. He attempted the teacher exam again in 1856, although the event caused a nervous breakdown and a second failure. However, these years were his greatest in terms of success both as teacher and as consummate experimentalist. Once abbot, his administrative duties came to occupy the majority of his time. Moreover, Mendel’s refusal to permit the monastery to pay the state’s new taxes for a religious fund led to his involvement in a long and bitter dispute with the authorities. Convinced that this tax was unconstitutional, he continued his opposition, refusing to comply even when the state took over the administration of some of the monastery’s estates and directed the profits to the religious fund.

In 1854 Abbot Cyril Napp permitted Mendel to plan a major experimental program in hybridization at the monastery. The aim of this program was to trace the transmission of hereditary characters in successive generations of hybrid progeny. Previous authorities had observed that progeny of fertile hybrids tended to revert to the originating species, and they had therefore concluded that hybridization could not be a mechanism used by nature to multiply species - though in exceptional cases some fertile hybrids did appear not to revert (the so-called “constant hybrids”). On the other hand, plant and animal breeders had long shown that crossbreeding could indeed produce a multitude of new forms. The latter point was of particular interest to landowners, including the abbot of the monastery, who was concerned about the monastery’s future profits from the wool of its Merino sheep, owing to competing wool being supplied from Australia.

Mendel chose to conduct his studies with the edible pea (Pisum sativum) because of the numerous distinct varieties, the ease of culture and control of pollination, and the high proportion of successful seed germinations. From 1854 to 1856 he tested 34 varieties for constancy of their traits. In order to trace the transmission of characters, he chose seven traits that were expressed in a distinctive manner, such as plant height (short or tall) and seed colour (green or yellow). He referred to these alternatives as contrasted characters, or character-pairs. He crossed varieties that differed in one trait - for instance, tall crossed with short. The first generation of hybrids (F1) displayed the character of one variety but not that of the other. In Mendel’s terms, one character was dominant and the other recessive. In the numerous progeny that he raised from these hybrids (the second generation, F2), however, the recessive character reappeared, and the proportion of offspring bearing the dominant to offspring bearing the recessive was very close to a 3 to 1 ratio. Study of the descendants (F3) of the dominant group showed that one-third of them were true-breeding and two-thirds were of hybrid constitution. The 3:1 ratio could hence be rewritten as 1:2:1, meaning that 50 percent of the F2 generation were true-breeding and 50 percent were still hybrid. This was Mendel’s major discovery, and it was unlikely to have been made by his predecessors, since they did not grow statistically significant populations, nor did they follow the individual characters separately to establish their statistical relations.

Mendel’s approach to experimentation came from his training in physics and mathematics, especially combinatorial mathematics. The latter served him ideally to represent his result. If A represents the dominant characteristic and a the recessive, then the 1:2:1 ratio recalls the terms in the expansion of the binomial equation: (A + a)2 = A2 + 2Aa + a2

Mendel realized further that he could test his expectation that the seven traits are transmitted independently of one another. Crosses involving first two and then three of his seven traits yielded categories of offspring in proportions following the terms produced from combining two binomial equations, indicating that their transmission was independent of one another. Mendel’s successors have called this conclusion the law of independent assortment.

Mendel went on to relate his results to the cell theory of fertilization, according to which a new organism is generated from the fusion of two cells. In order for pure breeding forms of both the dominant and the recessive type to be brought into the hybrid, there had to be some temporary accommodation of the two differing characters in the hybrid as well as a separation process in the formation of the pollen cells and the egg cells. In other words, the hybrid must form germ cells bearing the potential to yield either the one characteristic or the other. This has since been described as the law of segregation, or the doctrine of the purity of the germ cells. Since one pollen cell fuses with one egg cell, all possible combinations of the differing pollen and egg cells would yield just the results suggested by Mendel’s combinatorial theory.

Mendel first presented his results in two separate lectures in 1865 to the Natural Science Society in Brünn. His paper “Experiments on Plant Hybrids” was published in the society’s journal, Verhandlungen des naturforschenden Vereines in Brünn, the following year. It attracted little attention, although many libraries received it and reprints were sent out. The tendency of those who read it was to conclude that Mendel had simply demonstrated more accurately what was already widely assumed - namely, that hybrid progeny revert to their originating forms. They overlooked the potential for variability and the evolutionary implications that his demonstration of the recombination of traits made possible. Most notably, Swiss botanist Karl Wilhelm von Nägeli actually corresponded with Mendel, despite remaining skeptical as to the significance of his results and doubting that the germ cells in hybrids could be pure.

Mendel appears to have made no effort to publicize his work, and it is not known how many reprints of his paper he distributed. He had ordered 40 reprints, the whereabouts of only eight of which are known. Other than the journal that published his paper, 15 sources are known from the 19th century in which Mendel is mentioned in the context of plant hybridization. Few of these provide a clear picture of his achievement, and most are very brief.

By 1871 Mendel had only enough time to continue his meteorological and apicultural work. He traveled little, and his only visit to England was to see the Industrial Exhibition in 1862. Bright disease made his last years painful, and he died at the age of 62.

Achievements

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  Gregor Johann Mendel gained posthumous recognition as the founder of the modern science of genetics. Though farmers had known for millennia that crossbreeding of animals and plants could favor certain desirable traits, Mendel's pea plant experiments conducted between 1856 and 1863 established many of the rules of heredity, now referred to as the laws of Mendelian inheritance.
  
  With the huge recognition and the discovery done by Mendel in his lifetime and the base it put to the field of science, an award was named in the honor of the scientist named ‘Gregor Mendel Award’. This award is given to the scientists who work excellently for the cause of science. This award is delivered by Czech Academy of Science. In 1872, Mendel was nominated for the Order of Franz Josef.

Works

More photos

• book

  • Experiments in Plant Hybridisation 1866

Religion

Gregor Mendel became a friar 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." He was given the name Gregor (Řehoř in Czech) when he joined the Augustinian friars.

Politics

The Church where Mendel worked all the years followed Conservative National Party. The Church had never paid taxes and there was a huge opposition against Mendel when he supported the Liberal Party that wanted the Church to pay the taxes. He continued supporting the Liberal Party but put down the offer when he was given a chance to become a party candidate. Mendel remained very reserved about his political views.

Views

Being interested in the development of hybrid forms, Mendel also explained that the population descending from hybrids tends to revert to the pure parental forms, resulting in diminishing the hybrid's form. Thus, as a consequence of Mendelian segregation, Mendel also laid the basis for the interpretation of the effect of inbreeding. He was convinced, like Darwin, that it was impossible to draw a hard-and-fast line between species and varieties, and in the conclusion of his Pisum paper he expressed the conviction that the variability of cultivated plants could be explained by his theory.

Quotations: “My scientific studies have afforded me great gratification; and I am convinced that it will not be long before the whole world acknowledges the results of my work.”

“The value and utility of any experiment are determined by the fitness of the material to the purpose for which it is used, and thus in the case before us it cannot be immaterial what plants are subjected to experiment and in what manner such experiment is conducted.”

Membership

In 1968, Mendel was elected as the vice president of the National Science Society.

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  Vice president

  National Science Society

Personality

Mendel displayed a great love for nature all his life.

Quotes from others about the person

• Theodosius Dobzhansky: The foundations of population genetics were laid chiefly by mathematical deduction from basic premises contained in the works of Mendel and Morgan and their followers. Haldane, Wright, and Fisher are the pioneers of population genetics whose main research equipment was paper and ink rather than microscopes, experimental fields, Drosophila bottles, or mouse cages. Theirs is theoretical biology at its best, and it has provided a guiding light for rigorous quantitative experimentation and observation

Interests

• Philosophers & Thinkers

  F. Unger

Connections

Being a Monk, Mendel never got married and lived in celibacy his entire life.

Father:

Anton Mendel

Mother:

Rosine (Schwirtlich) Mendel

Sister:

Theresia Mendel

Sister:

Veronica Mendel

teacher:

Friedrich Franz

References

• Gregor Mendel: Planting the Seeds of Genetics
  2006
• Man of Science, Man of God Gregor Mendel - Discovering the Gene - For his 150th Anniversary
  2015
• Mendel's Principles of Heredity (Dover Books on Biology)
  2010
• Gregor Mendel: The Friar Who Grew Peas
  2015
• The Monk in the Garden: The Lost and Found Genius of Gregor Mendel, the Father of Genetics
  2005
• Gregor Mendel: Genetics Pioneer: Life Science (Science Readers)
  2007
• Gregor Mendel: And the Roots of Genetics (Oxford Portraits in Science)
• Mendel and the Laws of Genetics: Scientific Discoveries