botany botany botany, also called plant science(s), plant biology or phytology, is the science of plant life and a branch of biology. a botanist, plant scientist or phytologist is a scientist who specialises in this field. the term "botany" comes from the ancient greek word βοτάνη (botanē) meaning "pasture", "herbs" "grass", or "fodder"; βοτάνη is in turn derived from βόσκειν (boskein), "to feed" or "to graze". traditionally, botany has also included the study of fungi and algae by mycologists and phycologists respectively, with the study of these three groups of organisms remaining within the sphere of interest of the international botanical congress. nowadays, botanists (in the strict sense) study approximately 410,000 species of land plants of which some 391,000 species are vascular plants (including approximately 369,000 species of flowering plants), and approximately 20,000 are bryophytes. the fruit of myristica fragrans, a species native to indonesia, is the source of two valuable spices, the red aril (mace) enclosing the dark brown nutmeg. part of a series onbiologyscience of life index outline glossary history (timeline) key components cell theory ecosystem evolution phylogeny properties of life adaptation energy processing growth order regulation reproduction response to environment domains and kingdoms of life archaea bacteria eukarya (animals, fungi, plants, protists) branches anatomy biotechnology botany cell biology ecology evolutionary biology genetics marine biology microbiology molecular biology mycology neuroscience paleontology phycology physiology protistology virology zoology research biologist (list) list of biology awards list of journals list of research methods list of unsolved problems applications agricultural science biomedical sciences health technology pharming biology portal category botany originated in prehistory as herbalism with the efforts of early humans to identify – and later cultivate – plants that were edible, poisonous, and possibly medicinal, making it one of the first endeavours of human investigation. medieval physic gardens, often attached to monasteries, contained plants possibly having medicinal benefit. they were forerunners of the first botanical gardens attached to universities, founded from the 1540s onwards. one of the earliest was the padua botanical garden. these gardens facilitated the academic study of plants. efforts to catalogue and describe their collections were the beginnings of plant taxonomy, and led in 1753 to the binomial system of nomenclature of carl linnaeus that remains in use to this day for the naming of all biological species. in the 19th and 20th centuries, new techniques were developed for the study of plants, including methods of optical microscopy and live cell imaging, electron microscopy, analysis of chromosome number, plant chemistry and the structure and function of enzymes and other proteins. in the last two decades of the 20th century, botanists exploited the techniques of molecular genetic analysis, including genomics and proteomics and dna sequences to classify plants more accurately. modern botany is a broad, multidisciplinary subject with contributions and insights from most other areas of science and technology. research topics include the study of plant structure, growth and differentiation, reproduction, biochemistry and primary metabolism, chemical products, development, diseases, evolutionary relationships, systematics, and plant taxonomy. dominant themes in 21st century plant science are molecular genetics and epigenetics, which study the mechanisms and control of gene expression during differentiation of plant cells and tissues. botanical research has diverse applications in providing staple foods, materials such as timber, oil, rubber, fibre and drugs, in modern horticulture, agriculture and forestry, plant propagation, breeding and genetic modification, in the synthesis of chemicals and raw materials for construction and energy production, in environmental management, and the maintenance of biodiversity. history early botany an engraving of the cells of cork, from robert hooke's micrographia, 1665 botany originated as herbalism, the study and use of plants for their possible medicinal properties. the early recorded history of botany includes many ancient writings and plant classifications. examples of early botanical works have been found in ancient texts from india dating back to before 1100 bce, ancient egypt, in archaic avestan writings, and in works from china purportedly from before 221 bce. modern botany traces its roots back to ancient greece specifically to theophrastus (c. 371–287 bce), a student of aristotle who invented and described many of its principles and is widely regarded in the scientific community as the "father of botany". his major works, enquiry into plants and on the causes of plants, constitute the most important contributions to botanical science until the middle ages, almost seventeen centuries later. another work from ancient greece that made an early impact on botany is de materia medica, a five-volume encyclopedia about preliminary herbal medicine written in the middle of the first century by greek physician and pharmacologist pedanius dioscorides. de materia medica was widely read for more than 1,500 years. important contributions from the medieval muslim world include ibn wahshiyya's nabatean agriculture, abū ḥanīfa dīnawarī's (828–896) the book of plants, and ibn bassal's the classification of soils. in the early 13th century, abu al-abbas al-nabati, and ibn al-baitar (d. 1248) wrote on botany in a systematic and scientific manner. in the mid-16th century, botanical gardens were founded in a number of italian universities. the padua botanical garden in 1545 is usually considered to be the first which is still in its original location. these gardens continued the practical value of earlier "physic gardens", often associated with monasteries, in which plants were cultivated for suspected medicinal uses. they supported the growth of botany as an academic subject. lectures were given about the plants grown in the gardens. botanical gardens came much later to northern europe; the first in england was the university of oxford botanic garden in 1621. german physician leonhart fuchs (1501–1566) was one of "the three german fathers of botany", along with theologian otto brunfels (1489–1534) and physician hieronymus bock (1498–1554) (also called hieronymus tragus). fuchs and brunfels broke away from the tradition of copying earlier works to make original observations of their own. bock created his own system of plant classification. physician valerius cordus (1515–1544) authored a botanically and pharmacologically important herbal historia plantarum in 1544 and a pharmacopoeia of lasting importance, the dispensatorium in 1546. naturalist conrad von gesner (1516–1565) and herbalist john gerard (1545–c. 1611) published herbals covering the supposed medicinal uses of plants. naturalist ulisse aldrovandi (1522–1605) was considered the father of natural history, which included the study of plants. in 1665, using an early microscope, polymath robert hooke discovered cells, a term he coined, in cork, and a short time later in living plant tissue. early modern botany the linnaean garden of linnaeus' residence in uppsala, sweden, was planted according to his systema sexuale. during the 18th century, systems of plant identification were developed comparable to dichotomous keys, where unidentified plants are placed into taxonomic groups (e.g. family, genus and species) by making a series of choices between pairs of characters. the choice and sequence of the characters may be artificial in keys designed purely for identification (diagnostic keys) or more closely related to the natural or phyletic order of the taxa in synoptic keys. by the 18th century, new plants for study were arriving in europe in increasing numbers from newly discovered countries and the european colonies worldwide. in 1753, carl linnaeus published his species plantarum, a hierarchical classification of plant species that remains the reference point for modern botanical nomenclature. this established a standardised binomial or two-part naming scheme where the first name represented the genus and the second identified the species within the genus. for the purposes of identification, linnaeus's systema sexuale classified plants into 24 groups according to the number of their male sexual organs. the 24th group, cryptogamia, included all plants with concealed reproductive parts, mosses, liverworts, ferns, algae and fungi. this clinical categorization of plants was soon followed by the creation of the categories of race and sexuality; the classification of plants necessitated classification of all other living things, including humans. as a result, taxonomy and botany played an influential role in the development of scientific racism. one example of this progression is in the works of carl linnaeus, the previously mentioned 18th century botanist. as linnaeus moved on from classifying plants to classifying all organisms, he published systema naturae, a major classificatory piece that he would continue to edit and grow over time. in his 10th edition he expands from four "varieties" of man - europeans albus, americanus rubescens, asiaticus fuscus, and africanus niger, based on the four known continents - he also attributes certain skin color, medical temperament, body posture, physical traits, behavior, manner of clothing, and form of government to each variety of people. in these descriptions he labels asian people as stern, taught, and greedy; black people as sly, sluggish, and neglectful; white people as light, wise, and inventors. linnaeus is only one of many botanists who influenced scientific racism through the categorization of organisms. increasing knowledge of plant anatomy, morphology and life cycles led to the realisation that there were more natural affinities between plants than the artificial sexual system of linnaeus. adanson (1763), de jussieu (1789), and candolle (1819) all proposed various alternative natural systems of classification that grouped plants using a wider range of shared characters and were widely followed. the candollean system reflected his ideas of the progression of morphological complexity and the later bentham & hooker system, which was influential until the mid-19th century, was influenced by candolle's approach. darwin's publication of the origin of species in 1859 and his concept of common descent required modifications to the candollean system to reflect evolutionary relationships as distinct from mere morphological similarity. botany was greatly stimulated by the appearance of the first "modern" textbook, matthias schleiden's grundzüge der wissenschaftlichen botanik, published in english in 1849 as principles of scientific botany. schleiden was a microscopist and an early plant anatomist who co-founded the cell theory with theodor schwann and rudolf virchow and was among the first to grasp the significance of the cell nucleus that had been described by robert brown in 1831. in 1855, adolf fick formulated fick's laws that enabled the calculation of the rates of molecular diffusion in biological systems. the system in which early modern botany was practiced was very extensive. modern botany emerged following the surge in exploration of other continents by european colonizers. plant collectors would travel to different countries in search of new specimens for botanists to classify. plants usable for cultivataion would then be hybridized. the history of botany has been connected to imbalanced power structures in the past. slave labor was widespread not only in plantations but also in the running of botanical gardens; for example, on st. vincent island, plantation slavery was vital for the economic success of the sugar colonies and for the maintenance of the breadfruit cultivation project in the st. vincent botanical gardens. echeveria glauca in a connecticut greenhouse. botany uses latin names for identification; here, the specific name glauca means blue. late modern botany building upon the gene-chromosome theory of heredity that originated with gregor mendel (1822–1884), august weismann (1834–1914) proved that inheritance only takes place through gametes. no other cells can pass on inherited characters. the work of katherine esau (1898–1997) on plant anatomy is still a major foundation of modern botany. her books plant anatomy and anatomy of seed plants have been key plant structural biology texts for more than half a century. class of alpine botany in switzerland, 1936 the discipline of plant ecology was pioneered in the late 19th century by botanists such as eugenius warming, who produced the hypothesis that plants form communities, and his mentor and successor christen c. raunkiær whose system for describing plant life forms is still in use today. the concept that the composition of plant communities such as temperate broadleaf forest changes by a process of ecological succession was developed by henry chandler cowles, arthur tansley and frederic clements. clements is credited with the idea of climax vegetation as the most complex vegetation that an environment can support and tansley introduced the concept of ecosystems to biology. building on the extensive earlier work of alphonse de candolle, nikolai vavilov (1887–1943) produced accounts of the biogeography, centres of origin, and evolutionary history of economic plants. particularly since the mid-1960s there have been advances in understanding of the physics of plant physiological processes such as transpiration (the transport of water within plant tissues), the temperature dependence of rates of water evaporation from the leaf surface and the molecular