Gregor Mendel both his professors at the Palacký University, Olomouc (Friedrich Franz and Johann Karl Nestler), and his colleagues at the monastery (such as Franz Diebl) to study variation in plants. In 1854, Napp authorized Mendel to carry out a study in the monastery's experimental garden, which was originally planted by Napp in 1830. Unlike Nestler, who studied hereditary traits in sheep, Mendel used the common edible pea and started his experiments in 1856. After initial experiments with pea plants, Mendel settled on studying seven traits that seemed to be inherited independently of other traits: seed shape, flower color, seed coat tint,
Christian Carl André Christian Carl André Christian Carl André (1763-1831) was a leading 19th century European natural scientist, publisher, economist and educator. He was among the pioneers in the study of heredity whose vision paved the way for the research of Gregor Mendel, the founder of modern genetics. Christian Carl André was born on 20 March 1763 in the German town of Hildburghausen. He studied at the University of Jena, and worked as a teacher in Eisenach and at the Schnepfenthal Salzmann School in Gotha. Then from 1798 to 1820 he lived in Brno, then within the Habsburg empire, where he headed the