Experiments on Plant Hybridization Experiments on Plant Hybridization "Experiments on Plant Hybridization" (German: "Versuche über Pflanzen-Hybriden") is a seminal paper written in 1865 and published in 1866 by Gregor Mendel, an Augustinian friar considered to be the founder of modern genetics. The paper was the result after years spent studying genetic traits in "Pisum sativum", the pea plant. Mendel read his paper to the Natural History Society of Brünn. It was published in the "Proceedings of the Natural History Society of Brünn" the following year. In his paper, Mendel compared pairs of discrete traits: Through experimentation, Mendel discovered that one inheritable trait would invariably
Genetics and the Origin of Species that give them a competitive advantage, and they have the best chance of surviving and procreating. The main element lacking in the theory was any mechanism that would allow organisms to pass on these favorable variations. Lacking such a mechanism, the theory of evolution faced competition from theories such as neo-Lamarckism, in which the environment acted directly on organisms, changing their structures. Darwin did not know that the monk Gregor Mendel was already working on experiments that would explain inheritance in terms of units of heredity that we now call genes. When Mendelian genetics was rediscovered by several scientists, it