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Movement in Plants

Summary

The power of movement in plants, published on 7 November 1880, was the final large botanical work that Darwin wrote. It was the only work in which the assistance of one of his children, Francis Darwin, is mentioned on the title page. The research for this…

Matches: 26 hits

  • … this book seems to fit neatly into the realm of experimental plant physiology, but it was at its …
  • … mostly on the structure and structural changes of various plant organs and the mechanics of their …
  • … general law or system ’. Darwin was no stranger to physiology in contexts other than botany. …
  • … relied on some of the most advanced work on human and animal physiology to explain how certain …
  • … expression. Darwin had not done experimental work in animal physiology himself, but he applied the …
  • … Darwin was interested in similarities. What was the plant equivalent of digestion or reflex action …
  • … adapted to perform new functions, like climbing? For Darwin, physiology was a way of seeing how …
  • … of this research in his seminal handbook on experimental physiology of 1865. Sachs, who spent six …
  • … environmental influences, and the function of specific plant organs. This research had direct …
  • … published in the same year, became the standard work of plant physiology, and by the early 1870s, …
  • … leaves ’. Darwin then studied an even more interesting plant, a species of  Cassia  that was …
  • … to William Thiselton-Dyer how he ‘ syringed the plant for 2 minutes, & it was really beautiful …
  • … at Kew, provided information about  Averrhoa bilimbi , a plant that exhibited all three types of …
  • … on the movements of the first leaves to appear when a plant emerged from the seed. Noticing that in …
  • …  & Arachis hypogæa, & now I shall have a  third  plant, so as to observe how the flowers …
  • … August. Francis lost no time in quizzing Sachs about plant movement and bloom, reporting back …
  • … and growth. Francis described the disagreements about the physiology of the pulvinus, a joint-like …
  • … the affected side but turgescence would only result if the plant benefitted in some way, as …
  • … Müller, ‘ I am working away on some points in vegetable physiology; but though they interest me and …
  • … to receive more letters from other researchers. The Russian plant physiologist, Alexander Batalin …
  • … Kew in early April, but around this time Darwin’s work on plant movement was interrupted by his …
  • … another researcher Albert Frank, who like Darwin, looked at plant movement as adaptive behaviour. …
  • … had proposed that there were special forms of growth in plant organs, characterised by an inherent …
  • … relaying an appropriate response, based on the needs of the plant. In Würzburg, Francis was also …
  • … his French translator Édouard Heckel, who had worked on the physiology of plant movement; having …
  • … Darwin 1882). Darwin’s study of plant movement went beyond physiology in its scope, focusing not …

Insectivorous plants

Summary

Darwin’s work on insectivorous plants began by accident. While on holiday in the summer of 1860, staying with his wife’s relatives in Hartfield, Sussex, he went for long walks on the heathland and became curious about the large number of insects caught by…

Matches: 5 hits

  • … in Drosera and as he was ‘ so ignorant of vegetable physiology ’, he consulted his former …
  • … of all the species in the world… Is it not curious that a plant shd be far more sensitive to a touch …
  • … on the other hand, does not cause movement … it puts the plant to sleep! ’. Reasoning from these …
  • … when aristocratic horticulturist Dorothy Nevill leant him a plant of Utricularia montana . Darwin …
  • … their research on the effect of cobra poison on animal and plant tissue after Darwin had already …

British Association meeting 1860

Summary

Several letters refer to events at the British Association for the Advancement of Science held in Oxford, 26 June – 3 July 1860. Darwin had planned to attend the meeting but in the end was unable to. The most famous incident of the meeting was the verbal…

Matches: 5 hits

  • … 7 July, meeting of Section D (zoology and botany, including physiology). Although details concerning …
  • … session of Section D.—Zoology and botany, including physiology, President John Stevens Henslow …
  • … a bud or cutting of a pear or apple tree upon another plant of the same species. On the other hand, …
  • … Saturday session, Section D.—Zoology and botany, including physiology “On the Intellectual …
  • … and so it is with organisms in the world. From his work on Physiology, published in 1856, he gave …

Darwin’s reading notebooks

Summary

In April 1838, Darwin began recording the titles of books he had read and the books he wished to read in Notebook C (Notebooks, pp. 319–28). In 1839, these lists were copied and continued in separate notebooks. The first of these reading notebooks (DAR 119…

Matches: 30 hits

  • … [DAR *119: 3v.] Hunter has written Quarto work on Physiology 11  besides the paper …
  • … good art. on Entozore 12  by Owen in Encyclop. of Anat. & Physiology [R. Owen 1839] …
  • … Decandoelle has chapter on Sensitive Plants in his Physiology [A. P. de Candolle 1832] Col. …
  • … Hist Nat des Mammiférs [Lesson 1827] Haller’s Physiology [Haller 1754]— My Father 22 …
  • … Botan. Nomenclature [Steudel 1821–4]. Synonym of every plant & country— Recommended by Lindley— …
  • … Bot. Dict. 1841 [Paxton 1840]— probably good—every plant cultivated in Engl d — …
  • … st . series from 1792 to 1796— well read Hallers Physiology. Translat. [Haller 1754] Skimmed …
  • … 2. vols. 1801 to 1806. extracted. 9 th  Müllers Physiology [Müller 1837–42] 2 d . vol. …
  • … Smith Varieties of Human Race [S. S. Smith 1788]: Haller’s Physiology [Haller 1754]. Staunton …
  • … [Buckland 1836] June 7 th  Supplements to Müllers Physiology [Baly and Kirkes 1848] …
  • … 1847–60] Vols 3.4.5. Schleiden’s History of a Plant [Schleiden 1848] Barrande Syst. …
  • … the Amazon [A. R. Wallace 1853] —— Schleidens The Plant, a Biography [Schleiden 1848]. …
  • … [Lyell 1855] —— 29 th  Carpenters Comparative Physiology [Carpenter 1854] June 8 th …
  • … 79   The   cyclopædia of anatomy and physiology,  edited by Robert Bentley Todd, was issued …
  • … of the notebook. 84  John Lindley described plant breeding experiments performed by …
  • … , a spiny evergreen shrub with yellow flowers. The plant breeding company Vilmorin-Andrieux …
  • … animals, living and extinct . Part I.  Comparative   physiology . Boston. [Darwin Library.]  …
  • … Todd, Robert Bentley,  The cyclopædia of anatomy and   physiology . 5 vols. London. 1836–59.  …
  • … William Senhouse. 1848.  Recent   advances in the physiology of motion, the senses, &c. …
  • … Bevan, Edward. 1827. The honey-bee; its natural history, physiology, and management. London. [Darwin …
  • … 119: 21a Burgess, Thomas Henry. 1839.  The physiology or mechanism   of blushing; …
  • … William Benjamin. 1854.  Principles of   comparative physiology.  4th ed. London. [Darwin …
  • … Albrecht von. 1754.  Dr. Albrecht von Haller’s   physiology; being a course of lectures. …
  • … researches;   or, original memoirs in medicine, surgery, physiology,   geology, zoology, and …
  • … 119: 7a ——. 1852.  Chapters on mental physiology.  London. [Darwin Library; 2d ed. (1858) …
  • … 128: 10 Lawrence, William. 1819.  Lectures on physiology, zoology,   and the natural …
  • … chemistry in its   applications to agriculture and   physiology . Edited by Lyon Playfair. …
  • … letters on chemistry and its   relation to commerce, physiology, and agriculture . Edited by J. …
  • … *119: 13 Lord, Perceval Barton. 1834.  Popular physiology . London. [Other eds.]  *119: …
  • … *119: 18v. Schleiden, Matthias Jacob. 1848.  The plant; a biography . Translated by …

From morphology to movement: observation and experiment

Summary

Darwin was a thoughtful observer of the natural world from an early age. Whether on a grand scale, as exemplified by his observations on geology, or a microscopic one, as shown by his early work on the eggs and larvae of tiny bryozoans, Darwin was…

Matches: 5 hits

  • … his work on sexual selection and expression of emotions, plant physiology began to take centre stage …
  • … was already known, as he was ‘ so ignorant of vegetable physiology ’.  By the time he …
  • … in 1875, highlighted both differences and similarities in plant and animal physiology. Although the …
  • … from his association with one of the most advanced plant physiological laboratories in Germany (see …
  • … facilitate a more quantitative analysis of various types of plant movement. He could also keep his …

Animals, ethics, and the progress of science

Summary

Darwin’s view on the kinship between humans and animals had important ethical implications. In Descent, he argued that some animals exhibited moral behaviour and had evolved mental powers analogous to conscience. He gave examples of cooperation, even…

Matches: 7 hits

  • … on living creatures (vivisection) practiced in physiology. Vivisection had been performed in ancient …
  • … agree that it is justifiable for real investigations on physiology; but not for mere damnable and …
  • … sections, we have traced Darwin’s growing interest in physiology and the incorporation of its …
  • … to Henrietta, 4 January [1875] . I have long thought physiology one of the grandest of …
  • … in the search for abstract truth. It is certain that physiology can progress only by experiments on …
  • … … If nothing is done I look at the noble science of Physiology as doomed to death in this country. ( …
  • … induced any suffering, and was happy to leave the underlying physiology to others, incorporating the …

Climbing plants

Summary

Darwin’s book Climbing plants was published in 1865, but its gestation began much earlier. The start of Darwin’s work on the topic lay in his need, owing to severe bouts of illness in himself and his family, for diversions away from his much harder book on…

Matches: 10 hits

  • … on your Tendrils; I wonder what would be good & easy plant to raise in pot ’. Gray immediately …
  • … to touch, or irritability: ‘ I am observing the plant in another respect, namely the incessant …
  • … would be instrumental in explaining the morphology and physiology of climbing in its many forms.   …
  • … to focus on the differences in tendrils of different plant families and different kinds of tendrils. …
  • … ‘ that animals moved & plants did not ’.   Plant movement, however, could be puzzling, …
  • … undone. So do not forget me, if you notice at Kew any plant with odd tendrils ’. ‘A …
  • … question of which modified part the tendrils in different plant families were derived. His son …
  • … from his friends. He now had his own tropical pitcher plant ( Nepenthes ) in his hothouse, but …
  • … of the commonest means of transition is the same individual plant having the same part in different …
  • … not be long before Darwin would return to the subject of plant movement in all its forms; it was to …

Darwin and vivisection

Summary

Darwin played an important role in the controversy over vivisection that broke out in late 1874. Public debate was sparked when the Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals brought an unsuccessful prosecution against a French physiologist who…

Matches: 5 hits

  • … the nature and scope of vivisections performed in physiology laboratories and teaching hospitals, …
  • … largely ignorant of science might halt the progress of physiology. He reiterated these concerns in a …
  • … research on insectivorous plants. Indeed, some of Darwin’s plant experiments, such as applying toxic …
  • … agree that it is justifiable for real investigations on physiology; but not for mere damnable and …
  • … in the sciences of medicine, surgery, anatomy, and physiology … Any person, for the purpose of new …

Darwin in letters, 1882: Nothing too great or too small

Summary

In 1882, Darwin reached his 74th year Earthworms had been published the previous October, and for the first time in decades he was not working on another book. He remained active in botanical research, however. Building on his recent studies in plant…

Matches: 5 hits

  • … research, however. Building on his recent studies in plant physiology, he investigated the reactive …
  • … chemicals on chlorophyll by examining thin slices of plant tissue under a microscope. When not …
  • … from his previous work on insectivorous plants and the physiology of movement. The results of this …
  • … trustworthy … how little we know about the life of any one plant or animal!’ ( letter to Henry …
  • … Appendix VI). But he also strongly supported experimental physiology as a discipline. In February he …

Cross and self fertilisation

Summary

The effects of cross and self fertilisation in the vegetable kingdom, published on 10 November 1876, was the result of a decade-long project to provide evidence for Darwin’s belief that ‘‘Nature thus tells us, in the most emphatic manner, that she abhors…

Matches: 15 hits

  • … pollen from the same flower, & from pollen from a distinct plant of the same or of some other …
  • … had it existed in all individuals of such a common garden plant. Perhaps in the case of my plants it …
  • … of these seeds to Müller, hoping that he would ‘raise a plant, cover it with a net, & observe …
  • … a great series of trials. On the other hand seeds from this plant, fertilised by pollen from the …
  • … whether spontaneous crossing of different varieties of this plant occurred in the south of France …
  • … odorata ) was absolutely sterile with pollen from same plant in spite of the fact that stamens bent …
  • … & invariably leading to impotence when taken from the same plant!’ ( To J. D. Hooker, 21 May …
  • … of sexual reproduction’ In an article on plant sexual relations, Müller, who sent the …
  • … plants might have grown from seeds of the same ‘mother plant’ and that this close relationship had …
  • … ‘I am convinced that if you can prove that a plant growing in a distant place under different …
  • … Darwin replied, adding that he had sown seeds of this plant sent by Müller ( To Fritz Müller, 18 …
  • … the flowering season quite sterile with pollen from the same plant, though fertile with the pollen …
  • … of this fact. It had taken only one generation for the plant to go from self-sterility in its native …
  • … wonderful what an effect pollen from a distinct seedling plant which has been exposed to different …
  • … the importance of Darwin’s research and concluded that plant physiology had nothing as satisfying, …

Darwin in letters, 1875: Pulling strings

Summary

‘I am getting sick of insectivorous plants’, Darwin confessed in January 1875. He had worked on the subject intermittently since 1859, and had been steadily engaged on a book manuscript for nine months; January also saw the conclusion of a bitter dispute…

Matches: 9 hits

  • … great wish next summer to experimentise on some Marantaceous plant to make out meaning of 2 sets of …
  • … about the cruel treatment of animals in experimental physiology and medical teaching. Cobbe was an …
  • … suffering with his firm belief in the value of experimental physiology. He expressed his views to …
  • … Darwin’s keen interest in the progress of physiology was due in part to his research on the …
  • … on the comparative effects of cobra venom on animal and plant tissue. The experiments involved the …
  • … of the tentacles, noting that little or no harm came to the plant, and that the poison even acted as …
  • … here, the results of your investigations on the living plant to dozens of eager students.’ The …
  • … shan’t Be taken in or done for By any clever Plant … Great plates of honey you …
  • … Drosera (sundew), and Nepenthes (tropical pitcher-plant). He announced that he had isolated a …

Climbing Plants

Summary

Sources|Discussion Questions|Experiment A monograph by which to work After the publication of On the Origin of Species, Variation of Animals and Plants Under Domestication, The Descent of Man, and The Expression of the Emotions in Man and Animals in…

Matches: 6 hits

  • … in 1858, on the movements of the tendrils of a Cucurbitacean plant." …
  • … the possibilities for how the stimulus travels in the plant. The rest of the letter is filled with …
  • … that he is working on some observations in botanical physiology that he plans to publish with his …
  • … action in these tendrils is significant; it enables the plant to latch onto supports and climb ever …
  • … be easily replicated – all you need is a cucurbitaceous plant and a coffee stick! See if you can …
  • … not say it is final cause, but the result is pretty for the plant every 11⁄2 or 2 hours sweeps a …

Darwin's in letters, 1873: Animal or vegetable?

Summary

Having laboured for nearly five years on human evolution, sexual selection, and the expression of emotions, Darwin was able to devote 1873 almost exclusively to his beloved plants. He resumed work on the digestive powers of sundews and Venus fly traps, and…

Matches: 4 hits

  • … caused the outermost tentacles to bend inward, so that the plant closed like a fist. Darwin was …
  • … like the gastric juices in the stomach, so that the plant could be said “to feed like an animal” ( …
  • … was engaged in a taxonomic study of the pitcher plant,  Nepenthes . He began to perform …
  • … fluid of  Drosera . Darwin washed countless leaves of the plant in distilled water, sending the …

Darwin in letters, 1877: Flowers and honours

Summary

Ever since the publication of Expression, Darwin’s research had centred firmly on botany. The year 1877 was no exception. The spring and early summer were spent completing Forms of flowers, his fifth book on a botanical topic. He then turned to the…

Matches: 9 hits

  • … bloom, and Darwin in turn encouraged his son’s own work on plant sensitivity and digestion. William, …
  • … Primula , Linum , and Lythrum . ‘I will rank no plant as dimorphic without comparing pollen …
  • … of the same species, and even between flowers on the same plant. In effect, such forms were related …
  • … measure: ‘it might then be highly beneficial to [a plant] that the same flower or the same …
  • … (cucumber tree) and Desmodium gyrans (telegraph plant). ‘He is a good fellow but nurses a …
  • … observed the phenomenon in a Euphorbia (spurge) plant at Kew. Darwin then asked him to disturb …
  • … pursued questions that had been raised by his father on plant digestion and sensitivity. He measured …
  • … found in insectivorous plants like Drosera , enabling the plant to absorb nitrogenous matter. His …
  • … evolutionary history, and that all human groups had the same physiology of colour perception, though …

1879 Letters now online

Summary

In 1879, Darwin continued his research on movement in plants and researched, wrote, and published a short biography of his grandfather Erasmus Darwin as an introduction to a translation of an essay by Ernst Krause on Erasmus’s scientific work. Darwin’s son…

Matches: 1 hits

  • … Germany, learning the latest experimental techniques in plant physiology. As well as their regular …

Darwin in letters, 1878: Movement and sleep

Summary

In 1878, Darwin devoted most of his attention to the movements of plants. He investigated the growth pattern of roots and shoots, studying the function of specific organs in this process. Working closely with his son Francis, Darwin devised a series of…

Matches: 9 hits

  • … Julius Sachs’s botanical institute, one of most advanced plant laboratories in Europe. While …
  • … and experiment. He had begun a systematic study of plant movement in 1877, concentrating on the …
  • … ceased or nearly ceased.’ Finally, Darwin turned to plant motion below the ground, beginning …
  • … ). Son abroad Darwin’s experiments on plant movement were intensely collaborative, …
  • … ‘Frank seems getting on well … & is working away at physiology & at the accursed German …
  • … laboratories as part of their training. Sachs had worked on plant movement, including heliotropism …
  • … privately & he on practical grounds says he waters the pot-plant every day & never the …
  • … of work by Hugo de Vries and Julius Wiesner on the causes of plant movement, Darwin wrote on 25 …
  • … in one country from another … as he speaks of bringing the plant from Colorado, I imagine that it …

Was Darwin an ecologist?

Summary

One of the most fascinating aspects of Charles Darwin’s correspondence is the extent to which the experiments he performed at his home in Down, in the English county of Kent, seem to prefigure modern scientific work in ecology.

Matches: 3 hits

  • … history and biology. In his view, the academic discipline of physiology had neglected the …
  • … and so it would be in successive generations of the plant and moth. Thus it would appear that there …
  • … 1–972.  Sachs, Julius von. 1887.  Lectures on the physiology of plants . Translated by H. M. …

Forms of flowers

Summary

Darwin’s book The different forms of flowers on plants of the same species, published in 1877, investigated the structural differences in the sexual organs of flowers of the same species. It drew on and expanded five articles Darwin had published on the…

Matches: 7 hits

  • … in his Primula research, Darwin discovered that another plant, Linum grandiflorum , had two …
  • … blackboard the diagram of the three flower-forms of the plant, with dotted lines indicating which …
  • … 1865, but with ‘ widely different results ’. Another plant to interest Darwin was Pulmonaria …
  • … March 1867, Darwin received a small book from Hildebrand on plant sexuality. Hildebrand suggested a …
  • … work that moved from the realm of morphology into that of physiology. In his next book, The …
  • … were indications of dimorphism, but added, ‘I will rank no plant as dimorphic without comparing …
  • … research into the forms of flowers had changed the study of plant sexuality from a mere cataloguing …

Origin is 160; Darwin's 1875 letters now online

Summary

To mark the 160th anniversary of the publication of Origin of species, the full transcripts and footnotes of nearly 650 letters to and from Charles Darwin in 1875 are published online for the first time. You can read about Darwin's life in 1875…

Matches: 2 hits

  • … his experiments on the digestive fluid of the insectivorous plant  Drosera rotundifolia  (common …
  • … Parliament. Darwin thought her bill would damage research in physiology, and spent a week in London …

New material added to the American edition of Origin

Summary

A ‘revised and augmented’ American edition of Origin came on the market in July 1860, and was the only authorised edition available in the US until 1873. It incorporated many of the changes Darwin made to the second English edition, but still contained…

Matches: 4 hits

  • … as these, if we suppose that each species of animal and plant, or each great type of organisation, …
  • … by some of its supporters, is yet the only one to which physiology lends any countenance—their …
  • … sometimes more fertile than the perfect flowers; if the plant ceased to bear its perfect flowers, …
  • … transition would in fact be effected in the nature of the plant. Pages 293 and 294. 6 …
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