Gregor Mendel: biography, creativity, career, personal life. Mendel Gregor - biography, facts from life, photographs, background information Mendel Gregor Johann short biography

Mendel was a monk and took great pleasure in teaching mathematics and physics at a nearby school. But he failed to pass the state certification for the position of teacher. I saw his thirst for knowledge and very high intellectual abilities. He sent him to the University of Vienna for higher education. Gregor Mendel studied there for two years. He attended classes in natural sciences and mathematics. This helped him later formulate the laws of inheritance.

Difficult academic years

Gregor Mendel was the second child in a family of peasants with German and Slavic roots. In 1840, the boy completed six classes at the gymnasium, and the very next year he entered the philosophy class. But in those years, the family’s financial condition worsened, and 16-year-old Mendel had to take care of his own food. It was very difficult. Therefore, after completing his studies in philosophy classes, he became a novice in a monastery.

By the way, the name given to him at birth is Johann. Already in the monastery they began to call him Gregor. It was not in vain that he entered here, as he received patronage, as well as financial support, which made it possible to continue his studies. In 1847 he was ordained a priest. During this period he studied at theological school. There was a rich library here, which had a positive impact on learning.

Monk and teacher

Gregor, who did not yet know that he was the future founder of genetics, taught classes at school and, after failing the certification, ended up at the university. After graduation, Mendel returned to the city of Brunn and continued teaching natural history and physics. He tried again to get certified as a teacher, but the second attempt also failed.

Experiments with peas

Why is Mendel considered the founder of genetics? Since 1856, he began to conduct extensive and carefully thought-out experiments related to plant crossings in the monastery garden. Using the example of peas, he identified patterns of inheritance of various traits in the offspring of hybrid plants. Seven years later, the experiments were completed. And a couple of years later, in 1865, at meetings of the Brunn Society of Naturalists, he made a report on the work done. A year later, his article about experiments on plant hybrids was published. It was thanks to it that it was founded as an independent scientific discipline. Thanks to this, Mendel is the founder of genetics.

If earlier scientists could not put everything together and formulate principles, then Gregor succeeded. He created scientific rules for the study and description of hybrids, as well as their descendants. A symbolic system was developed and applied to indicate features. Mendel formulated two principles by which predictions about inheritance can be made.

Late recognition

Despite the publication of his article, the work received only one positive review. The German scientist Naegeli, who also studied hybridization, reacted favorably to Mendel’s works. But he also had doubts that the laws that were revealed only on peas could be universal. He advised that Mendel, the founder of genetics, repeat the experiments on other plant species. Gregor respectfully agreed with this.

He tried to repeat the experiments on the hawk, but the results were unsuccessful. And only many years later it became clear why this happened. The fact was that this plant produces seeds without sexual reproduction. There were also other exceptions to the principles laid down by the founder of genetics. After the publication of articles by famous botanists who confirmed Mendel's research, starting in 1900, there was recognition of his work. For this reason, 1900 is considered the year of birth of this science.

Everything that Mendel discovered convinced him that the laws he described with the help of peas were universal. It was only necessary to convince other scientists of this. But the task was as difficult as the scientific discovery itself. And all because knowing the facts and understanding them are completely different things. The fate of the geneticist's discovery, that is, the 35-year delay between the discovery itself and its public recognition, is not a paradox at all. In science this is quite normal. A century after Mendel, when genetics was already blossoming, the same fate befell McClintock's discoveries, which were not recognized for 25 years.

Heritage

In 1868, the scientist, the founder of genetics, Mendel, became abbot of the monastery. He almost completely stopped doing science. Notes on linguistics, beekeeping, and meteorology were found in his archives. On the site of this monastery there is currently a museum named after Gregor Mendel. A special scientific journal is also named in his honor.

MENDEL, GREGOR JOHANN(Mendel, Gregor Johann) (1822–1884), Austrian biologist, founder of genetics.

Born July 22, 1822 in Heinzendorf (Austria-Hungary, now Gincice, Czech Republic). He studied at the schools of Heinzendorf and Lipnik, then at the district gymnasium in Troppau. In 1843 he graduated from philosophical classes at the university in Olmutz and became a monk at the Augustinian Monastery of St. Thomas in Brunn (Austria, now Brno, Czech Republic). He served as an assistant pastor and taught natural history and physics at school. In 1851–1853 he was a volunteer student at the University of Vienna, where he studied physics, chemistry, mathematics, zoology, botany and paleontology. Upon returning to Brunn he worked as an assistant teacher in a secondary school until 1868, when he became abbot of the monastery. In 1856, Mendel began his experiments on crossing different varieties of peas that differed in single, strictly defined characteristics (for example, the shape and color of seeds). Accurate quantitative accounting of all types of hybrids and statistical processing of the results of experiments that he conducted for 10 years allowed him to formulate the basic laws of heredity - the splitting and combination of hereditary “factors”. Mendel showed that these factors are separate and do not merge or disappear when crossed. Although when crossing two organisms with contrasting traits (for example, yellow or green seeds), only one of them appears in the next generation of hybrids (Mendel called it “dominant”), the “disappeared” (“recessive”) trait reappears in subsequent generations. (Today Mendel's hereditary "factors" are called genes.)

Mendel reported the results of his experiments to the Brunn Society of Naturalists in the spring of 1865; a year later his article was published in the proceedings of this society. Not a single question was asked at the meeting, and the article received no responses. Mendel sent a copy of the article to K. Nägeli, a famous botanist and authoritative expert on problems of heredity, but Nägeli also failed to appreciate its significance. And only in 1900, Mendel’s forgotten work attracted everyone’s attention: three scientists at once, H. de Vries (Holland), K. Correns (Germany) and E. Chermak (Austria), having conducted their own experiments almost simultaneously, became convinced of the validity of Mendel’s conclusions . The law of independent segregation of characters, now known as Mendel's law, laid the foundation for a new direction in biology - Mendelism, which became the foundation of genetics.

Mendel himself, after unsuccessful attempts to obtain similar results by crossing other plants, stopped his experiments and until the end of his life was engaged in beekeeping, gardening and meteorological observations.

Among the scientist’s works - Autobiography(Gregorii Mendel autobiographia iuvenilis, 1850) and a number of articles, including Experiments on plant hybridization (Versuche über Pflanzenhybriden, in "Proceedings of the Brunn Society of Natural Scientists", vol. 4, 1866).

The Austrian priest and botanist Gregor Johann Mendel laid the foundations of the science of genetics. He mathematically deduced the laws of genetics, which are now called after him.

Johann Mendel was born on July 22, 1822 in Heisendorf, Austria. As a child, he began to show interest in studying plants and the environment. After two years of study at the Institute of Philosophy in Olmütz, Mendel decided to enter a monastery in Brünn. This happened in 1843. During the rite of tonsure as a monk, he was given the name Gregor. Already in 1847 he became a priest.

The life of a clergyman consists of more than just prayers. Mendel managed to devote a lot of time to study and science. In 1850, he decided to take the exams to become a teacher, but failed, receiving a “D” in biology and geology. Mendel spent 1851-1853 at the University of Vienna, where he studied physics, chemistry, zoology, botany and mathematics. Upon returning to Brunn, Father Gregor began teaching at school, although he never passed the exam to become a teacher. In 1868, Johann Mendel became abbot.

Mendel conducted his experiments, which ultimately led to the sensational discovery of the laws of genetics, in his small parish garden since 1856. It should be noted that the environment of the holy father contributed to scientific research. The fact is that some of his friends had a very good education in the field of natural science. They often attended various scientific seminars, in which Mendel also participated. In addition, the monastery had a very rich library, of which Mendel, naturally, was a regular. He was very inspired by Darwin's book "The Origin of Species", but it is known for certain that Mendel's experiments began long before the publication of this work.

On February 8 and March 8, 1865, Gregor (Johann) Mendel spoke at meetings of the Natural History Society in Brünn, where he spoke about his unusual discoveries in an as yet unknown field (which would later become known as genetics). Gregor Mendel conducted experiments on simple peas, however, later the range of experimental objects was significantly expanded. As a result, Mendel came to the conclusion that the various properties of a particular plant or animal do not just appear out of thin air, but depend on the “parents”. Information about these hereditary traits is passed on through genes (a term coined by Mendel, from which the term "genetics" is derived). Already in 1866, Mendel's book "Versuche uber Pflanzenhybriden" ("Experiments with plant hybrids") was published. However, contemporaries did not appreciate the revolutionary nature of the discoveries of the modest priest from Brunn.

Mendel's scientific research did not distract him from his daily duties. In 1868 he became abbot, mentor of the entire monastery. In this position, he excellently defended the interests of the church in general and the Brunn monastery in particular. He was good at avoiding conflicts with the authorities and avoiding excessive taxation. He was very loved by parishioners and students, young monks.

On January 6, 1884, Gregor's father (Johann Mendel) passed away. He is buried in his native Brunn. Fame as a scientist came to Mendel after his death, when experiments similar to his experiments in 1900 were independently carried out by three European botanists, who came to results similar to Mendel's.

Gregor Mendel - teacher or monk?

Mendel's fate after the Theological Institute is already arranged. The twenty-seven-year-old canon, ordained a priest, received an excellent parish in Old Brünn. He has been preparing to take exams for a doctorate in theology for a whole year when serious changes occur in his life. Georg Mendel decides to change his fate quite dramatically and refuses to perform religious services. He would like to study nature and for the sake of this passion, he decides to take a place at the Znaim Gymnasium, where by this time the 7th grade was opening. He asks for a position as a “sub-professor.”

In Russia, “professor” is a purely university title, but in Austria and Germany even the teacher of first-graders was called this title. Gymnasium suplent - this can rather be translated as “ordinary teacher”, “teacher’s assistant”. This could be a person with excellent knowledge of the subject, but since he did not have a diploma, he was hired rather temporarily.

A document has also been preserved explaining such an unusual decision of Pastor Mendel. This is an official letter to Bishop Count Schafgotsch from the abbot of the monastery of St. Thomas, Prelate Nappa.” Your Gracious Episcopal Eminence! The High Imperial-Royal Land Presidium, by decree No. Z 35338 of September 28, 1849, considered it best to appoint Canon Gregor Mendel as supplanter at the Znaim Gymnasium. “... This canon has a God-fearing lifestyle, abstinence and virtuous behavior, completely corresponding to his rank, combined with great devotion to the sciences... He is, however, somewhat less suitable for the care of the souls of the laity, for once he finds himself at the bedside of the sick , as at the sight of his suffering, we are overcome by insurmountable confusion and from this he himself becomes dangerously ill, which prompts me to resign from him the duties of a confessor.”

So, in the fall of 1849, canon and supporter Mendel arrived in Znaim to begin new duties. Mendel earns 40 percent less than his colleagues who had degrees. He is respected by his colleagues and loved by his students. However, he does not teach natural science subjects at the gymnasium, but classical literature, ancient languages ​​and mathematics. Need a diploma. This will make it possible to teach botany and physics, mineralogy and natural history. There were 2 paths to the diploma. One is to graduate from university, the other way - a shorter one - is to pass exams in Vienna before a special commission of the Imperial Ministry of Cults and Education for the right to teach such and such subjects in such and such classes.

Mendel's laws

The cytological foundations of Mendel's laws are based on:

Pairings of chromosomes (pairings of genes that determine the possibility of developing any trait)

Features of meiosis (processes occurring in meiosis, which ensure the independent divergence of chromosomes with the genes located on them to different pluses of the cell, and then into different gametes)

Features of the fertilization process (random combination of chromosomes carrying one gene from each allelic pair)

Mendel's scientific method

The basic patterns of transmission of hereditary characteristics from parents to descendants were established by G. Mendel in the second half of the 19th century. He crossed pea plants that differed in individual traits, and based on the results obtained, he substantiated the idea of ​​the existence of hereditary inclinations responsible for the manifestation of traits. In his works, Mendel used the method of hybridological analysis, which has become universal in the study of patterns of inheritance of traits in plants, animals and humans.

Unlike his predecessors, who tried to trace the inheritance of many characteristics of an organism in the aggregate, Mendel studied this complex phenomenon analytically. He observed the inheritance of just one pair or a small number of alternative (mutually exclusive) pairs of characters in garden pea varieties, namely: white and red flowers; short and tall stature; yellow and green, smooth and wrinkled pea seeds, etc. Such contrasting characteristics are called alleles, and the terms “allele” and “gene” are used as synonyms.

For crossings, Mendel used pure lines, that is, the offspring of one self-pollinating plant in which a similar set of genes is preserved. Each of these lines did not produce splitting of characters. It was also significant in the methodology of hybridological analysis that Mendel was the first to accurately calculate the number of descendants - hybrids with different characteristics, i.e., mathematically processed the results obtained and introduced the symbolism accepted in mathematics to record various crossing options: A, B, C, D and etc. With these letters he denoted the corresponding hereditary factors.

In modern genetics, the following conventions for crossing are accepted: parental forms - P; first generation hybrids obtained from crossing - F1; hybrids of the second generation - F2, third - F3, etc. The very crossing of two individuals is indicated by the sign x (for example: AA x aa).

Of the many different characters of crossed pea plants, in his first experiment Mendel took into account the inheritance of only one pair: yellow and green seeds, red and white flowers, etc. Such crossing is called monohybrid. If the inheritance of two pairs of characters is traced, for example, yellow smooth pea seeds of one variety and green wrinkled ones of another, then the crossing is called dihybrid. If three or more pairs of characteristics are taken into account, the crossing is called polyhybrid.

Patterns of inheritance of traits

Alleles are designated by letters of the Latin alphabet, while Mendel called some traits dominant (predominant) and designated them in capital letters - A, B, C, etc., others - recessive (inferior, suppressed), which he designated in lowercase letters - a, c, c, etc. Since each chromosome (carrier of alleles or genes) contains only one of two alleles, and homologous chromosomes are always paired (one paternal, the other maternal), diploid cells always have a pair of alleles: AA, aa, Aa , BB, bb. Bb, etc. Individuals and their cells that have a pair of identical alleles (AA or aa) in their homologous chromosomes are called homozygous. They can form only one type of germ cells: either gametes with the A allele or gametes with the a allele. Individuals who have both dominant and recessive Aa genes in the homologous chromosomes of their cells are called heterozygous; When germ cells mature, they form two types of gametes: gametes with the A allele and gametes with the a allele. In heterozygous organisms, the dominant allele A, which manifests itself phenotypically, is located on one chromosome, and the recessive allele a, suppressed by the dominant, is in the corresponding region (locus) of another homologous chromosome. In the case of homozygosity, each of the pair of alleles reflects either the dominant (AA) or recessive (aa) state of the genes, which will manifest their effect in both cases. The concept of dominant and recessive hereditary factors, first used by Mendel, is firmly established in modern genetics. Later the concepts of genotype and phenotype were introduced. Genotype is the totality of all genes that a given organism has. Phenotype is the totality of all the signs and properties of an organism that are revealed in the process of individual development under given conditions. The concept of phenotype extends to any characteristics of an organism: features of the external structure, physiological processes, behavior, etc. The phenotypic manifestation of characteristics is always realized on the basis of the interaction of the genotype with a complex of internal and external environmental factors.

The Austro-Hungarian scientist Gregor Mendel is rightfully considered the founder of the science of heredity - genetics. The researcher’s work, “rediscovered” only in 1900, brought posthumous fame to Mendel and served as the beginning of a new science, which was later called genetics. Until the end of the seventies of the 20th century, genetics mainly moved along the path paved by Mendel, and only when scientists learned to read the sequence of nucleic bases in DNA molecules, heredity began to be studied not by analyzing the results of hybridization, but relying on physicochemical methods.

Gregor Johann Mendel was born in Heisendorf in Silesia on July 22, 1822 into a peasant family. In elementary school, he showed outstanding mathematical abilities and, at the insistence of his teachers, continued his education at the gymnasium of the small nearby town of Opava. However, there was not enough money in the family for Mendel’s further education. With great difficulty they managed to scrape together enough to complete the gymnasium course. The younger sister Teresa came to the rescue: she donated the dowry that had been saved for her. With these funds, Mendel was able to study for some more time in university preparation courses. After this, the family's funds dried up completely.

A solution was suggested by mathematics professor Franz. He advised Mendel to join the Augustinian monastery in Brno. It was headed at that time by Abbot Cyril Napp, a man of broad views who encouraged the pursuit of science. In 1843, Mendel entered this monastery and received the name Gregor (at birth he was given the name Johann). Through
For four years, the monastery sent the twenty-five-year-old monk Mendel as a teacher in a secondary school. Then, from 1851 to 1853, he studied natural sciences, especially physics, at the University of Vienna, after which he became a teacher of physics and natural history at the real school in Brno.

His teaching activity, which lasted fourteen years, was highly appreciated by both the school management and students. According to the latter’s recollections, he was considered one of their favorite teachers. For the last fifteen years of his life, Mendel was the abbot of the monastery.

From his youth, Gregor was interested in natural history. More of an amateur than a professional biologist, Mendel constantly experimented with various plants and bees. In 1856 he began his classic work on hybridization and the analysis of the inheritance of characters in peas.

Mendel worked in a tiny monastery garden, less than two and a half hundred hectares. He sowed peas for eight years, manipulating two dozen varieties of this plant, different in flower color and seed type. He did ten thousand experiments. With his diligence and patience, he greatly amazed his partners, Winkelmeyer and Lilenthal, who helped him in necessary cases, as well as the gardener Maresh, who was very prone to drinking. If Mendel and
gave explanations to his assistants, they were unlikely to understand him.

Life flowed slowly in the monastery of St. Thomas. Gregor Mendel was also leisurely. Persistent, observant and very patient. Studying the shape of seeds in plants obtained as a result of crossings, in order to understand the patterns of transmission of only one trait (“smooth - wrinkled”), he analyzed 7324 peas. He examined each seed through a magnifying glass, comparing their shape and making notes.

With Mendel's experiments, another countdown of time began, the main distinguishing feature of which was, again, the hybridological analysis introduced by Mendel of the heredity of individual characteristics of parents in the offspring. It is difficult to say what exactly made the natural scientist turn to abstract thinking, distract himself from bare numbers and numerous experiments. But it was precisely this that allowed the modest teacher of the monastery school to see the holistic picture of the research; see it only after having to neglect the tenths and hundredths due to inevitable statistical variations. Only then, the alternative characteristics literally “labeled” by the researcher revealed something sensational to him: certain types of crossing in different offspring give a ratio of 3:1, 1:1, or 1:2:1.

Mendel turned to the works of his predecessors to confirm the guess that flashed through his mind. Those whom the researcher respected as authorities came at different times and each in his own way to the general conclusion: genes can have dominant (suppressive) or recessive (suppressed) properties. And if so, Mendel concludes, then the combination of heterogeneous genes gives the same splitting of characters that is observed in his own experiments. And in the very ratios that were calculated using his statistical analysis. “Checking the harmony with algebra” of the ongoing changes in the resulting generations of peas, the scientist even introduced letter designations, marking the dominant state with a capital letter and the recessive state of the same gene with a lowercase letter.

Mendel proved that each characteristic of an organism is determined by hereditary factors, inclinations (later they were called genes), transmitted from parents to offspring with reproductive cells. As a result of crossing, new combinations of hereditary characteristics may appear. And the frequency of occurrence of each such combination can be predicted.

Summarized, the results of the scientist’s work look like this:

All first generation hybrid plants are the same and exhibit the trait of one of the parents;

Among the second generation hybrids, plants with both dominant and recessive traits appear in a ratio of 3:1;

The two traits behave independently in the offspring and occur in all possible combinations in the second generation;

It is necessary to distinguish between traits and their hereditary inclinations (plants exhibiting dominant traits may carry latent
recessive makings);

The combination of male and female gametes is random in relation to the inclinations of what characteristics these gametes carry.

In February and March 1865, in two reports at meetings of the provincial scientific circle, called the Society of Naturalists of the city of Bru, one of its ordinary members, Gregor Mendel, reported the results of his many years of research, completed in 1863.

Despite the fact that his reports were received rather coldly by members of the circle, he decided to publish his work. It was published in 1866 in the works of the society entitled “Experiments on plant hybrids.”

Contemporaries did not understand Mendel and did not appreciate his work. For many scientists, refuting Mendel’s conclusion would mean nothing less than affirming their own concept, which states that an acquired trait can be “squeezed” into a chromosome and turned into an inherited one. As much as venerable scientists did not crush the “seditious” conclusion of the modest abbot of the monastery from Brno, they came up with all kinds of epithets in order to humiliate and ridicule. But time decided in its own way.

Yes, Gregor Mendel was not recognized by his contemporaries. The scheme seemed too simple and ingenuous to them, into which complex phenomena, which in the minds of mankind constituted the foundation of the unshakable pyramid of evolution, fit without pressure or creak. In addition, Mendel's concept also had vulnerabilities. That's how it seemed to his opponents, at least. And the researcher himself, too, since he could not dispel their doubts. One of the “culprits” of his failures was
Hawkgirl.

Botanist Karl von Naegeli, a professor at the University of Munich, having read Mendel’s work, suggested that the author test the laws he discovered on the hawkweed. This small plant was Naegeli's favorite subject. And Mendel agreed. He spent a lot of energy on new experiments. Hawkweed is an extremely inconvenient plant for artificial crossing. Very small. I had to strain my vision, but it began to deteriorate more and more. The offspring resulting from the crossing of the hawkweed did not obey the law, as he believed, to be correct for everyone. Only years later, after biologists established the fact of other, non-sexual reproduction of the hawksbill, the objections of Professor Naegeli, Mendel's main opponent, were removed from the agenda. But neither Mendel nor Nägeli himself, alas, were alive anymore.

The greatest Soviet geneticist, Academician B.L., spoke very figuratively about the fate of Mendel’s work. Astaurov, first president of the All-Union Society of Genetics and Breeders named after N.I. Vavilova: “The fate of Mendel’s classic work is perverse and not devoid of drama. Although he discovered, clearly demonstrated and largely understood very general patterns of heredity, the biology of that time had not yet matured to realize their fundamental nature. Mendel himself, with amazing insight, foresaw the general validity of the patterns discovered on peas and received some evidence of their applicability to some other plants (three types of beans, two types of gillyflower, corn and night beauty). However, his persistent and tedious attempts to apply the discovered patterns to the crossing of numerous varieties and species of hawkweed did not live up to expectations and suffered a complete fiasco. As happy as the choice of the first object (peas) was, the second was just as unsuccessful. Only much later, already in our century, it became clear that the peculiar patterns of inheritance of characteristics in the hawksbill are an exception that only confirms the rule. In Mendel's time, no one could suspect that the crossings he undertook between varieties of hawkweed actually did not occur, since this plant reproduces without pollination and fertilization, in a virgin way, through the so-called apogamy. The failure of painstaking and intense experiments, which caused almost complete loss of vision, the burdensome duties of a prelate that fell on Mendel and his advancing years forced him to stop his favorite research.

A few more years passed, and Gregor Mendel passed away, not foreseeing what passions would rage around his name and what glory it would ultimately be covered with. Yes, fame and honor will come to Mendel after his death. He will leave life without unraveling the secret of the hawk, which did not “fit” into the laws he derived for the uniformity of first-generation hybrids and the splitting of characteristics in the offspring.”

It would have been much easier for Mendel if he had known about the work of another scientist, Adams, who by that time had published a pioneering work on the inheritance of traits in humans. But Mendel was not familiar with this work. But Adams, based on empirical observations of families with hereditary diseases, actually formulated the concept of hereditary inclinations, noting the dominant and recessive inheritance of traits in humans. But botanists had not heard about the work of a doctor, and he probably had so much practical medical work to do that there was simply not enough time for abstract thoughts. In general, one way or another, geneticists learned about Adams’ observations only when they began seriously studying the history of human genetics.

Mendel was also unlucky. Too early, the great researcher reported his discoveries to the scientific world. The latter was not ready for this yet. Only in 1900, with the rediscovery of Mendel's laws, the world was amazed at the beauty of the logic of the researcher's experiment and the elegant accuracy of his calculations. And although the gene continued to remain a hypothetical unit of heredity, doubts about its materiality were finally dispelled.

Mendel was a contemporary of Charles Darwin. But the Brunn monk’s article did not catch the eye of the author of “The Origin of Species.” One can only guess how Darwin would have appreciated Mendel's discovery if he had become acquainted with it. Meanwhile, the great English naturalist showed considerable interest in plant hybridization. Crossing different forms of snapdragon, he wrote about the splitting of hybrids in the second generation: “Why is this so. God knows..."

Mendel died on January 6, 1884, as abbot of the monastery where he conducted his experiments with peas. Unnoticed by his contemporaries, Mendel, however, did not waver in his rightness. He said: “My time will come.” These words are inscribed on his monument, installed in front of the monastery garden where he conducted his experiments.

The famous physicist Erwin Schrödinger believed that the application of Mendel's laws was tantamount to the introduction of the quantum principle in biology.

The revolutionary role of Mendelism in biology became increasingly obvious. By the early thirties of our century, genetics and Mendel's underlying laws became the recognized foundation of modern Darwinism. Mendelism became the theoretical basis for the development of new high-yielding varieties of cultivated plants, more productive breeds of livestock, and beneficial species of microorganisms. Mendelism gave impetus to the development of medical genetics...

In the Augustinian monastery on the outskirts of Brno there is now a memorial plaque, and a beautiful marble monument to Mendel has been erected next to the front garden. The rooms of the former monastery, overlooking the front garden where Mendel conducted his experiments, have now been turned into a museum named after him. Here are collected manuscripts (unfortunately, some of them were lost during the war), documents, drawings and portraits related to the life of the scientist, books that belonged to him with his notes in the margins, a microscope and other instruments that he used, as well as those published in different countries books dedicated to him and his discovery.

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The Austro-Hungarian scientist Gregor Mendel is rightfully considered the founder of the science of heredity - genetics. The researcher’s work, “rediscovered” only in 1900, brought posthumous fame to Mendel and served as the beginning of a new science, which was later called genetics. Until the end of the seventies of the 20th century, genetics mainly moved along the path paved by Mendel, and only when scientists learned to read the sequence of nucleic bases in DNA molecules, heredity began to be studied not by analyzing the results of hybridization, but relying on physicochemical methods.

Gregor Johann Mendel was born in Heisendorf in Silesia on July 22, 1822 into a peasant family. In elementary school, he showed outstanding mathematical abilities and, at the insistence of his teachers, continued his education at the gymnasium of the small nearby town of Opava. However, there was not enough money in the family for Mendel’s further education. With great difficulty they managed to scrape together enough to complete the gymnasium course. The younger sister Teresa came to the rescue: she donated the dowry that had been saved for her. With these funds, Mendel was able to study for some more time in university preparation courses. After this, the family's funds dried up completely.

A solution was suggested by mathematics professor Franz. He advised Mendel to join the Augustinian monastery in Brno. It was headed at that time by Abbot Cyril Knapp, a man of broad views who encouraged the pursuit of science. In 1843, Mendel entered this monastery and received the name Gregor (at birth he was given the name Johann). Through
For four years, the monastery sent the twenty-five-year-old monk Mendel as a teacher in a secondary school. Then, from 1851 to 1853, he studied natural sciences, especially physics, at the University of Vienna, after which he became a teacher of physics and natural history at the real school in Brno.

His teaching activity, which lasted fourteen years, was highly appreciated by both the school management and students. According to the latter’s recollections, he was considered one of their favorite teachers. For the last fifteen years of his life, Mendel was the abbot of the monastery.

From his youth, Gregor was interested in natural history. More of an amateur than a professional biologist, Mendel constantly experimented with various plants and bees. In 1856 he began his classic work on hybridization and the analysis of the inheritance of characters in peas.

Mendel worked in a tiny monastery garden, less than two and a half hundred hectares. He sowed peas for eight years, manipulating two dozen varieties of this plant, different in flower color and seed type. He did ten thousand experiments. With his diligence and patience, he greatly amazed his partners, Winkelmeyer and Lilenthal, who helped him in necessary cases, as well as the gardener Maresh, who was very prone to drinking. If Mendel and
gave explanations to his assistants, they were unlikely to understand him.

Life flowed slowly in the monastery of St. Thomas. Gregor Mendel was also leisurely. Persistent, observant and very patient. Studying the shape of seeds in plants obtained as a result of crossings, in order to understand the patterns of transmission of only one trait (“smooth - wrinkled”), he analyzed 7324 peas. He examined each seed through a magnifying glass, comparing their shape and making notes.

With Mendel's experiments, another countdown of time began, the main distinguishing feature of which was, again, the hybridological analysis introduced by Mendel of the heredity of individual characteristics of parents in the offspring. It is difficult to say what exactly made the natural scientist turn to abstract thinking, distract himself from bare numbers and numerous experiments. But it was precisely this that allowed the modest teacher of the monastery school to see the holistic picture of the research; see it only after having to neglect the tenths and hundredths due to inevitable statistical variations. Only then, the alternative characteristics literally “labeled” by the researcher revealed something sensational to him: certain types of crossing in different offspring give a ratio of 3:1, 1:1, or 1:2:1.

Mendel turned to the works of his predecessors to confirm the guess that flashed through his mind. Those whom the researcher respected as authorities came at different times and each in his own way to the general conclusion: genes can have dominant (suppressive) or recessive (suppressed) properties. And if so, Mendel concludes, then the combination of heterogeneous genes gives the same splitting of characters that is observed in his own experiments. And in the very ratios that were calculated using his statistical analysis. “Checking the harmony with algebra” of the ongoing changes in the resulting generations of peas, the scientist even introduced letter designations, marking the dominant state with a capital letter and the recessive state of the same gene with a lowercase letter.

Mendel proved that each characteristic of an organism is determined by hereditary factors, inclinations (later they were called genes), transmitted from parents to offspring with reproductive cells. As a result of crossing, new combinations of hereditary characteristics may appear. And the frequency of occurrence of each such combination can be predicted.

Summarized, the results of the scientist’s work look like this:

- all hybrid plants of the first generation are identical and exhibit the trait of one of the parents;

— among the second generation hybrids, plants with both dominant and recessive traits appear in a ratio of 3:1;

— two traits behave independently in the offspring and occur in all possible combinations in the second generation;

— it is necessary to distinguish between traits and their hereditary inclinations (plants exhibiting dominant traits may carry latent
recessive makings);

- the union of male and female gametes is accidental in relation to the makings of what characteristics these gametes carry.

In February and March 1865, in two reports at meetings of the provincial scientific circle, called the Society of Naturalists of the city of Bru, one of its ordinary members, Gregor Mendel, reported the results of his many years of research, completed in 1863.

Despite the fact that his reports were received rather coldly by members of the circle, he decided to publish his work. It was published in 1866 in the works of the society entitled “Experiments on plant hybrids.”

Contemporaries did not understand Mendel and did not appreciate his work. For many scientists, refuting Mendel’s conclusion would mean nothing less than affirming their own concept, which states that an acquired trait can be “squeezed” into a chromosome and turned into an inherited one. As much as venerable scientists did not crush the “seditious” conclusion of the modest abbot of the monastery from Brno, they came up with all kinds of epithets in order to humiliate and ridicule. But time decided in its own way.

Yes, Gregor Mendel was not recognized by his contemporaries. The scheme seemed too simple and ingenuous to them, into which complex phenomena, which in the minds of mankind constituted the foundation of the unshakable pyramid of evolution, fit without pressure or creak. In addition, Mendel's concept also had vulnerabilities. That's how it seemed to his opponents, at least. And the researcher himself, too, since he could not dispel their doubts. One of the “culprits” of his failures was
Hawkgirl.

Botanist Karl von Naegeli, a professor at the University of Munich, having read Mendel’s work, suggested that the author test the laws he discovered on the hawkweed. This small plant was Naegeli's favorite subject. And Mendel agreed. He spent a lot of energy on new experiments. Hawkweed is an extremely inconvenient plant for artificial crossing. Very small. I had to strain my vision, but it began to deteriorate more and more. The offspring resulting from the crossing of the hawkweed did not obey the law, as he believed, to be correct for everyone. Only years later, after biologists established the fact of other, non-sexual reproduction of the hawksbill, the objections of Professor Naegeli, Mendel's main opponent, were removed from the agenda. But neither Mendel nor Nägeli himself, alas, were alive anymore.

The greatest Soviet geneticist, Academician B.L., spoke very figuratively about the fate of Mendel’s work. Astaurov, first president of the All-Union Society of Genetics and Breeders named after N.I. Vavilova: “The fate of Mendel’s classic work is perverse and not devoid of drama. Although he discovered, clearly demonstrated and largely understood very general patterns of heredity, the biology of that time had not yet matured to realize their fundamental nature. Mendel himself, with amazing insight, foresaw the general validity of the patterns discovered on peas and received some evidence of their applicability to some other plants (three types of beans, two types of gillyflower, corn and night beauty). However, his persistent and tedious attempts to apply the discovered patterns to the crossing of numerous varieties and species of hawkweed did not live up to expectations and suffered a complete fiasco. As happy as the choice of the first object (peas) was, the second was just as unsuccessful. Only much later, already in our century, it became clear that the peculiar patterns of inheritance of characteristics in the hawksbill are an exception that only confirms the rule. In Mendel's time, no one could suspect that the crossings he undertook between varieties of hawkweed actually did not occur, since this plant reproduces without pollination and fertilization, in a virgin way, through the so-called apogamy. The failure of painstaking and intense experiments, which caused almost complete loss of vision, the burdensome duties of a prelate that fell on Mendel and his advancing years forced him to stop his favorite research.

A few more years passed, and Gregor Mendel passed away, not foreseeing what passions would rage around his name and what glory it would ultimately be covered with. Yes, fame and honor will come to Mendel after his death. He will leave life without unraveling the secret of the hawk, which did not “fit” into the laws he derived for the uniformity of first-generation hybrids and the splitting of characteristics in the offspring.”

It would have been much easier for Mendel if he had known about the work of another scientist, Adams, who by that time had published a pioneering work on the inheritance of traits in humans. But Mendel was not familiar with this work. But Adams, based on empirical observations of families with hereditary diseases, actually formulated the concept of hereditary inclinations, noting the dominant and recessive inheritance of traits in humans. But botanists had not heard about the work of a doctor, and he probably had so much practical medical work to do that there was simply not enough time for abstract thoughts. In general, one way or another, geneticists learned about Adams’ observations only when they began seriously studying the history of human genetics.

Mendel was also unlucky. Too early, the great researcher reported his discoveries to the scientific world. The latter was not ready for this yet. Only in 1900, with the rediscovery of Mendel's laws, the world was amazed at the beauty of the logic of the researcher's experiment and the elegant accuracy of his calculations. And although the gene continued to remain a hypothetical unit of heredity, doubts about its materiality were finally dispelled.

Mendel was a contemporary of Charles Darwin. But the Brunn monk’s article did not catch the eye of the author of “The Origin of Species.” One can only guess how Darwin would have appreciated Mendel's discovery if he had become acquainted with it. Meanwhile, the great English naturalist showed considerable interest in plant hybridization. Crossing different forms of snapdragon, he wrote about the splitting of hybrids in the second generation: “Why is this so. God knows..."

Mendel died on January 6, 1884, as abbot of the monastery where he conducted his experiments with peas. Unnoticed by his contemporaries, Mendel, however, did not waver in his rightness. He said: “My time will come.” These words are inscribed on his monument, installed in front of the monastery garden where he conducted his experiments.

The famous physicist Erwin Schrödinger believed that the application of Mendel's laws was tantamount to the introduction of the quantum principle in biology.

The revolutionary role of Mendelism in biology became increasingly obvious. By the early thirties of our century, genetics and Mendel's underlying laws became the recognized foundation of modern Darwinism. Mendelism became the theoretical basis for the development of new high-yielding varieties of cultivated plants, more productive breeds of livestock, and beneficial species of microorganisms. Mendelism gave impetus to the development of medical genetics...

In the Augustinian monastery on the outskirts of Brno there is now a memorial plaque, and a beautiful marble monument to Mendel has been erected next to the front garden. The rooms of the former monastery, overlooking the front garden where Mendel conducted his experiments, have now been turned into a museum named after him. Here are collected manuscripts (unfortunately, some of them were lost during the war), documents, drawings and portraits related to the life of the scientist, books that belonged to him with his notes in the margins, a microscope and other instruments that he used, as well as those published in different countries books dedicated to him and his discovery.