Edwin Stephen Goodrich
Encyclopedia
Edwin Stephen Goodrich was an English zoologist, specialising in comparative anatomy
, embryology
, paleontology
, and evolution
. He held the Linacre Chair of Zoology
in the University of Oxford
from 1921 to 1946. He served as editor of the Quarterly Journal of Microscopical Science
from 1920 until his death.
; there he met E. Ray Lankester, who interested him in zoology.
On coming to Oxford from London, Goodrich entered Merton College, Oxford
as an undergraduate in 1892 and, while acting as assistant to Lankester, read for the final honour school in Zoology; he was awarded the Rolleston
Memorial Prize in 1894 and graduated with first-class honours the following year.
In 1913 Goodrich married Helen Pixell, a distinguished protozoologist
, who helped greatly with his work. His artistic training always stood him in good stead. He drew diagrams of beauty and clarity whilst lecturing (students used to photograph the blackboard before it was erased), and in his books and papers. He also exhibited his watercolor landscapes in London. Goodrich was elected Fellow of the Royal Society in 1905 and received its Royal Medal
in 1936. He was honorary member of the New York Academy of Science and of many other academies, and awarded many honorary doctorates. In 1945 Lev Berg of Leningrad
sent a message through Julian Huxley
: “Please tell [Goodrich] that... we all regard ourselves as his pupils.” A small, dapper, thin man with a dry sense of humor, he always complained that, when traveling by air, he was not weighed with his luggage, since his own weight was only half that of an average passenger.
at Oxford University, he made Goodrich his assistant in 1892; this marked the start of the researches which during half a century made Goodrich the greatest comparative anatomist of his day. In 1921 Goodrich was appointed to his mentor's old post, which he held until 1945.
From the start of his researches, many of which were devoted to marine organisms, Goodrich made himself acquainted at first hand with the marine fauna of Plymouth
, Roscoff
, Banyuls, Naples
, Helgoland, Bermuda
, Madeira
, and the Canary Islands
. He also traveled extensively in Europe, the United States, North Africa, India, Ceylon, Malaya
, and Java
. He worked out the significance of the tubes connecting the centres of the bodies of animals with the outside. There are nephridia, developed from the outer layer inward and serving the function of excretion
. Quite different from them are coelomoducts, developed from the middle layer outward, serving to release the germ cell
s. These two sets of tubes may look similar, when each opens into the body cavity through a funnel surrounded by cilia which create a current of fluid. In some groups the nephridia may disappear (as in vertebrates, where the nephridia may have been converted into the thymus gland), and the coelomoducts then take on the additional function of excretion. This is why man has a genitourinary system. Before Goodrich's analysis, the whole subject was in chaos.
Goodrich established that a motor nerve remains linked to its corresponding segmental muscle, however much it may have become displaced or obscured in development. He showed that organs can be homologous
without arising from the same segments of the body. For example, the fins and limbs of vertebrates; and the occipital arch
(the back of the skull), which varies in vertebrates from the fifth to the ninth segment.
He distinguished between the scale structures of fishes, living and fossil, by which they are classified and recognized. This is important because different strata
may identified by fossil fish scales. Goodrich's attention was always focused on evolution
, to which he made notable contributions, firmly adhering to Darwin's theory of natural selection
.
He was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society in May 1905.
On his seventieth birthday, in 1938, his colleagues and pupils published a festschrift
edited by Gavin de Beer: Evolution: essays on aspects of evolutionary biology.
Comparative anatomy
Comparative anatomy is the study of similarities and differences in the anatomy of organisms. It is closely related to evolutionary biology and phylogeny .-Description:...
, embryology
Embryology
Embryology is a science which is about the development of an embryo from the fertilization of the ovum to the fetus stage...
, paleontology
Paleontology
Paleontology "old, ancient", ὄν, ὀντ- "being, creature", and λόγος "speech, thought") is the study of prehistoric life. It includes the study of fossils to determine organisms' evolution and interactions with each other and their environments...
, and evolution
Evolution
Evolution is any change across successive generations in the heritable characteristics of biological populations. Evolutionary processes give rise to diversity at every level of biological organisation, including species, individual organisms and molecules such as DNA and proteins.Life on Earth...
. He held the Linacre Chair of Zoology
Linacre Chair of Zoology
The position of Linacre Professor of Zoology in the University of Oxford was founded in 1860, initially as the Linacre Professorship of Physiology and then as the chair of Human and Comparative Anatomy, although its origins can be traced back a further 300 years, to the Linacre Lectureships at...
in the University of Oxford
University of Oxford
The University of Oxford is a university located in Oxford, United Kingdom. It is the second-oldest surviving university in the world and the oldest in the English-speaking world. Although its exact date of foundation is unclear, there is evidence of teaching as far back as 1096...
from 1921 to 1946. He served as editor of the Quarterly Journal of Microscopical Science
Journal of Cell Science
The Journal of Cell Science is a peer-reviewed scientific journal in the field of cell biology. The journal is published by the The Company of Biologists with 24 annual issues....
from 1920 until his death.
Life
When Goodrich was two weeks old his father died, and his mother took her children to live with her mother at Pau, France, where he attended the local English school and a French lycée. In 1888 he entered the Slade School of Art at University College LondonUniversity College London
University College London is a public research university located in London, United Kingdom and the oldest and largest constituent college of the federal University of London...
; there he met E. Ray Lankester, who interested him in zoology.
On coming to Oxford from London, Goodrich entered Merton College, Oxford
Merton College, Oxford
Merton College is one of the constituent colleges of the University of Oxford in England. Its foundation can be traced back to the 1260s when Walter de Merton, chancellor to Henry III and later to Edward I, first drew up statutes for an independent academic community and established endowments to...
as an undergraduate in 1892 and, while acting as assistant to Lankester, read for the final honour school in Zoology; he was awarded the Rolleston
George Rolleston
George Rolleston MA MD FRCP FRS was an English physician and zoologist. He was the first Linacre Professor of Anatomy and Physiology to be appointed at the University of Oxford, a post he held from 1860 until his death in 1881...
Memorial Prize in 1894 and graduated with first-class honours the following year.
In 1913 Goodrich married Helen Pixell, a distinguished protozoologist
Protozoology
Protozoology is the study of protozoa, the "animal-like" protists. This term has become dated as our understanding of the evolutionary relationships of the eukaryota has improved....
, who helped greatly with his work. His artistic training always stood him in good stead. He drew diagrams of beauty and clarity whilst lecturing (students used to photograph the blackboard before it was erased), and in his books and papers. He also exhibited his watercolor landscapes in London. Goodrich was elected Fellow of the Royal Society in 1905 and received its Royal Medal
Royal Medal
The Royal Medal, also known as The Queen's Medal, is a silver-gilt medal awarded each year by the Royal Society, two for "the most important contributions to the advancement of natural knowledge" and one for "distinguished contributions in the applied sciences" made within the Commonwealth of...
in 1936. He was honorary member of the New York Academy of Science and of many other academies, and awarded many honorary doctorates. In 1945 Lev Berg of Leningrad
Leningrad
Leningrad is the former name of Saint Petersburg, Russia.Leningrad may also refer to:- Places :* Leningrad Oblast, a federal subject of Russia, around Saint Petersburg* Leningrad, Tajikistan, capital of Muminobod district in Khatlon Province...
sent a message through Julian Huxley
Julian Huxley
Sir Julian Sorell Huxley FRS was an English evolutionary biologist, humanist and internationalist. He was a proponent of natural selection, and a leading figure in the mid-twentieth century evolutionary synthesis...
: “Please tell [Goodrich] that... we all regard ourselves as his pupils.” A small, dapper, thin man with a dry sense of humor, he always complained that, when traveling by air, he was not weighed with his luggage, since his own weight was only half that of an average passenger.
Career
When Lankester became Linacre Professor of Comparative AnatomyLinacre Chair of Zoology
The position of Linacre Professor of Zoology in the University of Oxford was founded in 1860, initially as the Linacre Professorship of Physiology and then as the chair of Human and Comparative Anatomy, although its origins can be traced back a further 300 years, to the Linacre Lectureships at...
at Oxford University, he made Goodrich his assistant in 1892; this marked the start of the researches which during half a century made Goodrich the greatest comparative anatomist of his day. In 1921 Goodrich was appointed to his mentor's old post, which he held until 1945.
From the start of his researches, many of which were devoted to marine organisms, Goodrich made himself acquainted at first hand with the marine fauna of Plymouth
Plymouth
Plymouth is a city and unitary authority area on the coast of Devon, England, about south-west of London. It is built between the mouths of the rivers Plym to the east and Tamar to the west, where they join Plymouth Sound...
, Roscoff
Roscoff
Roscoff is a commune in the Finistère department of Brittany in northwestern France.The nearby Île de Batz, called Enez Vaz in Breton, is a small island that can be reached by launch from the harbour....
, Banyuls, Naples
Naples
Naples is a city in Southern Italy, situated on the country's west coast by the Gulf of Naples. Lying between two notable volcanic regions, Mount Vesuvius and the Phlegraean Fields, it is the capital of the region of Campania and of the province of Naples...
, Helgoland, Bermuda
Bermuda
Bermuda is a British overseas territory in the North Atlantic Ocean. Located off the east coast of the United States, its nearest landmass is Cape Hatteras, North Carolina, about to the west-northwest. It is about south of Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada, and northeast of Miami, Florida...
, Madeira
Madeira
Madeira is a Portuguese archipelago that lies between and , just under 400 km north of Tenerife, Canary Islands, in the north Atlantic Ocean and an outermost region of the European Union...
, and the Canary Islands
Canary Islands
The Canary Islands , also known as the Canaries , is a Spanish archipelago located just off the northwest coast of mainland Africa, 100 km west of the border between Morocco and the Western Sahara. The Canaries are a Spanish autonomous community and an outermost region of the European Union...
. He also traveled extensively in Europe, the United States, North Africa, India, Ceylon, Malaya
British Malaya
British Malaya loosely described a set of states on the Malay Peninsula and the Island of Singapore that were brought under British control between the 18th and the 20th centuries...
, and Java
Java
Java is an island of Indonesia. With a population of 135 million , it is the world's most populous island, and one of the most densely populated regions in the world. It is home to 60% of Indonesia's population. The Indonesian capital city, Jakarta, is in west Java...
. He worked out the significance of the tubes connecting the centres of the bodies of animals with the outside. There are nephridia, developed from the outer layer inward and serving the function of excretion
Excretion
Excretion is the process by which waste products of metabolism and other non-useful materials are eliminated from an organism. This is primarily carried out by the lungs, kidneys and skin. This is in contrast with secretion, where the substance may have specific tasks after leaving the cell...
. Quite different from them are coelomoducts, developed from the middle layer outward, serving to release the germ cell
Germ cell
A germ cell is any biological cell that gives rise to the gametes of an organism that reproduces sexually. In many animals, the germ cells originate near the gut of an embryo and migrate to the developing gonads. There, they undergo cell division of two types, mitosis and meiosis, followed by...
s. These two sets of tubes may look similar, when each opens into the body cavity through a funnel surrounded by cilia which create a current of fluid. In some groups the nephridia may disappear (as in vertebrates, where the nephridia may have been converted into the thymus gland), and the coelomoducts then take on the additional function of excretion. This is why man has a genitourinary system. Before Goodrich's analysis, the whole subject was in chaos.
Goodrich established that a motor nerve remains linked to its corresponding segmental muscle, however much it may have become displaced or obscured in development. He showed that organs can be homologous
Homology (biology)
Homology forms the basis of organization for comparative biology. In 1843, Richard Owen defined homology as "the same organ in different animals under every variety of form and function". Organs as different as a bat's wing, a seal's flipper, a cat's paw and a human hand have a common underlying...
without arising from the same segments of the body. For example, the fins and limbs of vertebrates; and the occipital arch
Occipital bone
The occipital bone, a saucer-shaped membrane bone situated at the back and lower part of the cranium, is trapezoidal in shape and curved on itself...
(the back of the skull), which varies in vertebrates from the fifth to the ninth segment.
He distinguished between the scale structures of fishes, living and fossil, by which they are classified and recognized. This is important because different strata
Stratum
In geology and related fields, a stratum is a layer of sedimentary rock or soil with internally consistent characteristics that distinguish it from other layers...
may identified by fossil fish scales. Goodrich's attention was always focused on evolution
Evolution
Evolution is any change across successive generations in the heritable characteristics of biological populations. Evolutionary processes give rise to diversity at every level of biological organisation, including species, individual organisms and molecules such as DNA and proteins.Life on Earth...
, to which he made notable contributions, firmly adhering to Darwin's theory of natural selection
Natural selection
Natural selection is the nonrandom process by which biologic traits become either more or less common in a population as a function of differential reproduction of their bearers. It is a key mechanism of evolution....
.
He was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society in May 1905.
On his seventieth birthday, in 1938, his colleagues and pupils published a festschrift
Festschrift
In academia, a Festschrift , is a book honoring a respected person, especially an academic, and presented during his or her lifetime. The term, borrowed from German, could be translated as celebration publication or celebratory writing...
edited by Gavin de Beer: Evolution: essays on aspects of evolutionary biology.
Selected works
- Goodrich E.S. 1909. The Vertebrata Craniata (Cyclostomes and Fishes). Volume IX of Lankester E. Ray (ed) Treatise on Zoology, London.
- Goodrich, Edwin S. 1924. Living organisms: an account of their origin and evolution. Oxford University Press.
- Goodrich E.S. 1930. Studies on the structure and development of Vertebrates. Macmillan, London. xxx+837p, 754 figures. One of the great works of vertebrate comparative anatomy.
- Goodrich E.S. 1895. On the coelom, genital ducts, and nephridia. Q.J.M.S. 37, 477–510.
- Goodrich E.S. 1913. Metameric segmentation and homology, Q.J.M.S. 59, 227–248.
- Goodrich E.S. 1927. The problem of the sympathetic nervous system from the morphological point of view. Proceedings of the Anatomical Society of Great Britain and Ireland, Journal of Anatomy 61, p499.
- Goodrich E.S. 1934. The early development of the nephridia in Amphioxus, Introduction and part I: Hatschek's Nephridium. Q.J.M.S. 76, 499–510.
- Goodrich E.S. 1934. 'The early development of the nephridia in Amphioxus, part II: The paired nephridia. Q.J.M.S. 76, 655–674.
- Goodrich E.S. 1945. The study of nephridia and genital ducts since 1895. Q.J.M.S. 86, 113–392.