Fritz Müller
Fritz Müller | |
|---|---|
University of Berlin | |
| Known for | Müllerian mimicry |
| Scientific career | |
| Fields | Biology |
Johann Friedrich Theodor Müller (German pronunciation: [ˈjoːhan ˈfʁiːdʁɪç ˈteːodoːɐ̯ ˈmʏlɐ]; 31 March 1822 – 21 May 1897), better known as Fritz Müller (Brazilian Portuguese: [ˈfɾits ˈmileʁ]), and also as Müller-Desterro,[1][2] was a German biologist who emigrated to southern Brazil, where he lived in and near the city of Blumenau, Santa Catarina. There he studied the natural history of the Atlantic forest and was an early advocate of Darwinism. Müllerian mimicry is named after him.[3]
Life
Müller was born in the village of Windischholzhausen, near
Müller was disappointed by the failure of the
Müller gained an official teaching post, and spent a decade teaching mathematics at a college in
In his retirement years, Müller received many offers of support and offers of financial help. He was one of many naturalists to visit and work in South America during the nineteenth century, but was the only one to settle in Brazil for the rest of his life. A statue of Müller was erected in Blumenau in 1929.[6]
Biology
During his life Müller published over 70 papers in English and Portuguese, and also in German-language periodicals. The topics covered a range of natural topics from entomology, marine biology and botany.
In Müllerian mimicry, an advantage is gained when unpalatable species resemble each other, especially when the predator has a good memory for colour (as birds, for instance, do have). Thus one trial may work to dissuade a bird from several species of butterfly which all have the same warning coloration. Müller and other naturalists believed that such systems of mimicry could only come about by means of natural selection, and all of them wrote about it.
Another of Müller's discoveries were the Müllerian bodies in the flowering plant genus Cecropia. Müller was able to show that the small bodies at the petiole-bases of Cecropia are food bodies and are used by protecting ants of the genus Azteca which inhabit the hollow stems of these fast growing trees.
Much of Müller's botany was stimulated by the series of botanical works published by Darwin. After Darwin's Fertilisation of Orchids (1862) he spent years of work on orchids, sending observations to his brother Hermann and to Darwin. Darwin used some of this work in his second edition of 1877, and Hermann later became famous for his work on pollination. On Climbing plants (1867) Müller lent a letter to Darwin listing 40 genera of climbing plants classified by their method of climbing. The next few months saw more observations, which Darwin had translated and published as Müller's first paper in English.
Müller and Darwin
Müller became a strong supporter of
Extensive correspondence exists between Müller and Darwin, and Müller also corresponded with his brother Hermann Müller, Alexander Agassiz, Ernst Krause and Ernst Haeckel.
References
- New International Encyclopedia(1st ed.). New York: Dodd, Mead.
- ^ Rines, George Edwin, ed. (1920). . Encyclopedia Americana.
- ^ West, David A. 2003. Fritz Müller: a naturalist in Brazil. Blacksburg: Pocahontas Press.
- Rio de la Plata.
- ^ Henry Bates notes the "splendid climate of Desterro" and its links with German settlements. Bates H.W. 1882. Central America, the West Indies and South America. 2nd revised ed., Stanford, London. p 432, 436 and map of the Seaports of Brazil opp p427.
- ^ Bates H.W. 1882. Central America, the West Indies and South America. 2nd revised ed., Stanford, London. p408 et seq
- ^ Müller, Fritz 1878. Über die Vortheile der Mimicry bei Schmetterlingen. Zoologischer Anzeiger 1, 54–55. Müller F. 1879. Ituna and Thyridia: a remarkable case of mimicry in butterflies. (transl. R. Meldola) Proceedings of the Entomological Society of London 20-29.
- ^ Müller, Fritz 1867. Notes on some of the climbing-plants near Desterro in South Brazil. J Linn Soc (Botany) 9, 344-9 (read 7 Dec 1865).
- ISBN 1-84246-085-4.
- ^ see the notes on the letter from Darwin to Müller at http://www.darwinproject.ac.uk/entry-4881
Biographies
- Alfred Möller, 1920. Fritz Müller. Werke, Briefe und Leben [virtually the sole biographical source for this significant biologist]
- Cezar Zillig, 1997. Dear Mr. Darwin. A intimidade da correspondência entre Fritz Müller e Charles Darwin. Sky/Anima Comunicação e Design, São Paulo, 241 pp. [letters between Müller and Darwin, with very interesting comments on the life of Fritz Müller. In Portuguese]
- ISBN 3-486-56337-8, [contains a short biography and much information on the contemporary context, including Darwinism in Germany, Haeckel, Krause, etc.]
- David A. West, 2003. Fritz Müller: A Naturalist in Brazil. Blacksburg: Pocahontas Press. ISBN 0-936015-92-6[modern, and most welcome, though the biographical information rests almost entirely on Möller's book. West adds excellent summaries and assessments of Müller's biological work]
External links
- Works by Fritz Müller at Project Gutenberg
- Works by or about Fritz Müller at Internet Archive
- Dr. Fritz Müller on Some Difficult Cases of Mimicry (1882)
- Fritz Müller on mimicry
- Review of West's biography (pdf file)
- Another review of West's biography, and a different photo of Müller
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