Félix Dujardin (April 5, 1802 – April 8, 1860) was a
FrenchFrance , officially the French Republic , is a country located in Western Europe, with several overseas islands and territories located on other continents. Metropolitan France extends from the Mediterranean Sea to the English Channel and the North Sea, and from the Rhine to the Atlantic Ocean...
biologistA biologist is a scientist devoted to and producing results in biology through the study of life.Typically biologists study organisms and their relationship to their environment. Biologists involved in basic research attempt to discover underlying mechanisms that govern how organisms work...
born in
ToursTours is a city in central France, the capital of the Indre-et-Loire department.It is located on the lower reaches of the river Loire, between Orléans and the Atlantic coast. Touraine, the region around Tours, is known for its wines, the alleged perfection of its local spoken French, and for the...
. He is remembered for his research of protozoans and other invertebrates.
In 1840 he was appointed professor of
geologyGeology is the science and study of the solid and liquid matter that constitutes the Earth. The field of geology encompasses the study of the composition, structure, physical properties, dynamics, and history of Earth materials, and the processes by which they are formed, moved, and changed...
and
mineralogyMineralogy is an Earth Science focused around the chemistry, crystal structure, and physical properties of minerals. Specific studies within mineralogy include the processes of mineral origin and formation, classification of minerals, their geographical distribution, as well as their...
at the
University of ToulouseThe University of Toulouse is a consortium of universities and other institutions of higher education and research, named after one of the earliest universities established in Europe in 1229, and including the successor universities to that earlier university...
, and during the following year was a professor of
zoologyZoology, also spelled zoölogy, is the branch of biology that focuses on the structure, function, behavior, and evolution of animals. The zoologist's pronunciation of "zoology" is , though a common spelling pronunciation is .-Systems of classification:...
and
botanyBotany, plant science, phytology, or plant biology is a branch of biology and is the scientific study of plant life and development...
at
RennesThe Parlement de Bretagne| map =|region = Bretagne|department = Ille-et-Vilaine|arrondissement = Rennes|canton = Chief town of 11 cantons|INSEE = 35238...
. Later in his career he became a member of the French
Académie des sciences. Concerning his educational background, Dujardin was largely self-taught.
Dujardin is primarily known for his work with microscopic animal life, and in 1834 proposed that a new group of one-celled organisms be called
Rhizopoda; meaning "root-foot.
Félix Dujardin (April 5, 1802 – April 8, 1860) was a
FrenchFrance , officially the French Republic , is a country located in Western Europe, with several overseas islands and territories located on other continents. Metropolitan France extends from the Mediterranean Sea to the English Channel and the North Sea, and from the Rhine to the Atlantic Ocean...
biologistA biologist is a scientist devoted to and producing results in biology through the study of life.Typically biologists study organisms and their relationship to their environment. Biologists involved in basic research attempt to discover underlying mechanisms that govern how organisms work...
born in
ToursTours is a city in central France, the capital of the Indre-et-Loire department.It is located on the lower reaches of the river Loire, between Orléans and the Atlantic coast. Touraine, the region around Tours, is known for its wines, the alleged perfection of its local spoken French, and for the...
. He is remembered for his research of protozoans and other invertebrates.
In 1840 he was appointed professor of
geologyGeology is the science and study of the solid and liquid matter that constitutes the Earth. The field of geology encompasses the study of the composition, structure, physical properties, dynamics, and history of Earth materials, and the processes by which they are formed, moved, and changed...
and
mineralogyMineralogy is an Earth Science focused around the chemistry, crystal structure, and physical properties of minerals. Specific studies within mineralogy include the processes of mineral origin and formation, classification of minerals, their geographical distribution, as well as their...
at the
University of ToulouseThe University of Toulouse is a consortium of universities and other institutions of higher education and research, named after one of the earliest universities established in Europe in 1229, and including the successor universities to that earlier university...
, and during the following year was a professor of
zoologyZoology, also spelled zoölogy, is the branch of biology that focuses on the structure, function, behavior, and evolution of animals. The zoologist's pronunciation of "zoology" is , though a common spelling pronunciation is .-Systems of classification:...
and
botanyBotany, plant science, phytology, or plant biology is a branch of biology and is the scientific study of plant life and development...
at
RennesThe Parlement de Bretagne| map =|region = Bretagne|department = Ille-et-Vilaine|arrondissement = Rennes|canton = Chief town of 11 cantons|INSEE = 35238...
. Later in his career he became a member of the French
Académie des sciences. Concerning his educational background, Dujardin was largely self-taught.
Dujardin is primarily known for his work with microscopic animal life, and in 1834 proposed that a new group of one-celled organisms be called
Rhizopoda; meaning "root-foot. The name was later changed to
ProtozoaProtozoa or Cornelius protozoans Protozoa or Cornelius protozoans Protozoa or Cornelius protozoans (from Greek πρῶτον proton "first" and ζῷα zoa "animals"; singular protozoon; (the word "protozoan" is originally an adjective, used as a noun) are microorganisms classified as unicellular eukaryotes....
. He refuted
naturalistNatural history is the scientific research of plants or animals, leaning more towards the observational than experimental methods of study, and encompasses more research that is published in magazines than in academic journals. Grouped among the natural sciences, Natural history is the systematic...
Christian Gottfried EhrenbergChristian Gottfried Ehrenberg , German naturalist, zoologist, comparative anatomist, geologist, and microscopist, was one of the most famous and productive scientists of his time.- Early collections :...
's (1795–1876) concept that microscopic organisms are "complete organisms" similar to higher animals .
In
ForaminiferaThe Foraminifera, or forams for short, are a large group of amoeboid protists with reticulating pseudopods, fine strands of cytoplasm that branch and merge to form a dynamic net. They typically produce a test, or shell, which can have either one or multiple chambers, some becoming quite elaborate...
, he noticed an apparently formless life substance that he named "sarcode"; which was later renamed
protoplasmProtoplasm is the living contents of a cell that are surrounded by a plasma membrane. This term is not commonly used in modern cell biology. Protoplasm is composed of a mixture of small molecules such as ions, amino acids, monosaccharides and water, and macromolecules such as nucleic acids,...
by
Hugo von Mohl Hugo von Mohl was a German botanist from Stuttgart.He was a son of the Württemberg statesman Benjamin Ferdinand von Mohl , the family being connected on both sides with the higher class of state officials of Württemberg...
(1805-1872). In addition, he conducted extensive research of invertebrate groups that included
echinodermEchinoderm, there are seven main classes of Echinoderms which are brittle stars, basket stars, sea urchins, sand dollars, sea lilies, feather stars, and sea cucumbers...
s, helminths and cnidarians.
In 1850 he was the first to describe the
mushroom bodiesThe mushroom bodies or corpora pedunculata are a pair of structures in the brain of insects and other arthropods. They are usually described as neuropils, i.e. as dense networks of neurons and glia. They get their name from their roughly hemispherical calyx, a protuberance that is joining to the...
, key structures in the insects'
nervous systemThe nervous system is a network of specialized cells that communicate information about an organism's surroundings and itself. It processes this information and causes reactions in other parts of the body. It is composed of neurons and other specialized cells called glial cells that aid in the...
.
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