Gregor Johann Mendel was an Austrian

Austrian Empire

The Austrian Empire was a modern era successor empire, which was centered on what is today's Austria and which officially lasted from 1804 to 1867. It was followed by the Empire of Austria-Hungary, whose proclamation was a diplomatic move that elevated Hungary's status within the Austrian Empire...

 scientist and Augustinian

Augustinians

The term Augustinians, named after Saint Augustine of Hippo , applies to two separate and unrelated types of Catholic religious orders:...

 friar

Friar

A friar is a member of one of the mendicant orders.-Friars and monks:...

 who gained posthumous fame as the founder of the new science of genetics

Genetics

Genetics , a discipline of biology, is the science of genes, heredity, and variation in living organisms....

. Mendel demonstrated that the inheritance of certain traits in pea

Pea

A pea is most commonly the small spherical seed or the seed-pod of the pod fruit Pisum sativum. Each pod contains several peas. Peapods are botanically a fruit, since they contain seeds developed from the ovary of a flower. However, peas are considered to be a vegetable in cooking...

 plants follows particular patterns, now referred to as the laws of Mendelian inheritance

Mendelian inheritance

Mendelian inheritance is a scientific description of how hereditary characteristics are passed from parent organisms to their offspring; it underlies much of genetics...

. Although the significance of Mendel's work was not recognized until the turn of the 20th century, the independent rediscovery of these laws formed the foundation of the modern science of genetics.
Mendel was born into an ethnic German family in Heinzendorf bei Odrau, Austrian Silesia

Austrian Silesia

Austrian Silesia , officially the Duchy of Upper and Lower Silesia was an autonomous region of the Kingdom of Bohemia and the Austrian Empire, from 1867 a Cisleithanian crown land of Austria-Hungary...

, Austrian Empire

Austrian Empire

The Austrian Empire was a modern era successor empire, which was centered on what is today's Austria and which officially lasted from 1804 to 1867. It was followed by the Empire of Austria-Hungary, whose proclamation was a diplomatic move that elevated Hungary's status within the Austrian Empire...

 (now Hynčice, Czech Republic), and was baptized two days later as Johann.