Karl Theodor Ernst von Siebold
Encyclopedia
Germany
Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...
physiologist and zoologist. He was responsible for the introduction of the taxa Arthropoda and Rhizopoda, and for defining the taxon Protozoa
Protozoa
Protozoa are a diverse group of single-cells eukaryotic organisms, many of which are motile. Throughout history, protozoa have been defined as single-cell protists with animal-like behavior, e.g., movement...
specifically for single-celled organisms.
Biography
He was born at WürzburgWürzburg
Würzburg is a city in the region of Franconia which lies in the northern tip of Bavaria, Germany. Located at the Main River, it is the capital of the Regierungsbezirk Lower Franconia. The regional dialect is Franconian....
, Bavaria
Bavaria
Bavaria, formally the Free State of Bavaria is a state of Germany, located in the southeast of Germany. With an area of , it is the largest state by area, forming almost 20% of the total land area of Germany...
, the son of a professor of obstetrics and a cousin (some say younger brother) to the naturalist and physician Philipp Franz von Siebold
Philipp Franz von Siebold
Philipp Franz Balthasar von Siebold was a German physician and traveller. He was the first European to teach Western medicine in Japan...
.
Von Siebold studied medicine and science chiefly at the University of Berlin (under K. A. Rudolphi
Karl Rudolphi
Karl Asmund Rudolphi was a Swedish-born naturalist, who is credited with being the "father of helminthology"....
) and also at Göttingen
Göttingen
Göttingen is a university town in Lower Saxony, Germany. It is the capital of the district of Göttingen. The Leine river runs through the town. In 2006 the population was 129,686.-General information:...
(under Johann Friedrich Blumenbach
Johann Friedrich Blumenbach
Johann Friedrich Blumenbach was a German physician, physiologist and anthropologist, one of the first to explore the study of mankind as an aspect of natural history, whose teachings in comparative anatomy were applied to classification of what he called human races, of which he determined...
), submitting a thesis on the metamorphosis of the salamander. In 1831 he began to practise medicine in Heilsberg, East Prussia (now Lidzbark Warmiński
Lidzbark Warminski
Lidzbark Warmiński is a town in the Warmian-Masurian Voivodeship in Poland. It is the capital of Lidzbark County.- History :The town was originally an Old Prussian settlement known as Lecbarg until being conquered in 1240 by the Teutonic Knights, who called it Heilsberg...
), moving in 1834 to Königsberg
Königsberg
Königsberg was the capital of East Prussia from the Late Middle Ages until 1945 as well as the northernmost and easternmost German city with 286,666 inhabitants . Due to the multicultural society in and around the city, there are several local names for it...
, and then in the same year to be Director of the Hebammenschule in Danzig
Gdansk
Gdańsk is a Polish city on the Baltic coast, at the centre of the country's fourth-largest metropolitan area.The city lies on the southern edge of Gdańsk Bay , in a conurbation with the city of Gdynia, spa town of Sopot, and suburban communities, which together form a metropolitan area called the...
.
He became professor of zoology, comparative anatomy and veterinary science at Erlangen
Erlangen
Erlangen is a Middle Franconian city in Bavaria, Germany. It is located at the confluence of the river Regnitz and its large tributary, the Untere Schwabach.Erlangen has more than 100,000 inhabitants....
in 1840, professor of zoology and physiology at Freiburg
Freiburg
Freiburg im Breisgau is a city in Baden-Württemberg, Germany. In the extreme south-west of the country, it straddles the Dreisam river, at the foot of the Schlossberg. Historically, the city has acted as the hub of the Breisgau region on the western edge of the Black Forest in the Upper Rhine Plain...
in 1845, professor of physiology at Breslau in 1850, and professor of zoology and comparative anatomy at the Maximilians-Universität in Munich in 1853. In Munich, he later received the additional duties as professor of zoology and director of the zoological and zootomical cabinet.
He was elected a member of the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences
Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences
The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences or Kungliga Vetenskapsakademien is one of the Royal Academies of Sweden. The Academy is an independent, non-governmental scientific organization which acts to promote the sciences, primarily the natural sciences and mathematics.The Academy was founded on 2...
in 1856.
He died in Munich on 7 April 1885. He was considered “an industrious and critical observer and ... as his biographer justly calls him, the Nestor of German zoology” (quote from 1911 Encyclopædia Britannica).
Scientific work
His best known publication was the Lehrbuch der Vergleichenden Anatomie (Manual of Comparative Anatomy) (1845-48) which he co-edited with Hermann Friedrich StanniusHermann Friedrich Stannius
Hermann Friedrich Stannius was a German anatomist, physiologist and entomologist...
, being largely responsible for the first volume, on invertebrates (see Principal Publications). Siebold was the originator, after Cuvier
Georges Cuvier
Georges Chrétien Léopold Dagobert Cuvier or Jean Léopold Nicolas Frédéric Cuvier , known as Georges Cuvier, was a French naturalist and zoologist...
, of the first important reforms in systematic zoology, and established the unicellular nature of the Protozoa
Protozoa
Protozoa are a diverse group of single-cells eukaryotic organisms, many of which are motile. Throughout history, protozoa have been defined as single-cell protists with animal-like behavior, e.g., movement...
, which he first combined into a phylum. He introduced the taxa Arthropoda and Rhizopoda. In 1848, together with R. A. von Kölliker
Albert von Kölliker
Albert von Kölliker was a Swiss anatomist and physiologist.-Biography:Albert Kölliker was born in Zurich, Switzerland. His early education was carried on in Zurich, and he entered the university there in 1836...
he founded the leading biological journal Zeitschrift für wissenschaftliche Zoologie, which he edited until his death. This was long the leading morphological and anatomical journal of Europe
Europe
Europe is, by convention, one of the world's seven continents. Comprising the westernmost peninsula of Eurasia, Europe is generally 'divided' from Asia to its east by the watershed divides of the Ural and Caucasus Mountains, the Ural River, the Caspian and Black Seas, and the waterways connecting...
.
His scientific accomplishments included (in 1851) collaborating with Theodor Bilharz
Theodor Bilharz
Theodor Maximilian Bilharz was a German physician and an important pioneer in the field of parasitology.-Education:...
on the first description of the blood-fluke Schistosoma haematobium
Schistosoma haematobium
Schistosoma haematobium is an important digenetic trematode, and is found in the Middle East, India, Portugal and Africa. It is a major agent of schistosomiasis; more specifically, it is associated with urinary schistosomiasis....
, (in 1853) the elucidation of the life cycle of the tapeworm Echinococcus granulosus
Echinococcus granulosus
Echinococcus granulosus, also called the Hydatid worm or Hyper Tape-worm, is a cyclophyllid cestode that parasitizes the small intestine of canids as an adult, but which has important intermediate hosts such as livestock and humans, where it causes hydatid disease...
, (in 1854) the suggestion that the cercariae of the fluke Fasciola hepatica
Fasciola hepatica
Fasciola hepatica, also known as the common liver fluke or sheep liver fluke, is a parasitic flatworm of the class Trematoda, phylum Platyhelminthes that infects the livers of various mammals, including humans. The disease caused by the fluke is called fascioliasis . F...
were the infective stage which passed from the invertebrate to the vertebrate host, and (in 1856) the discovery of parthenogenesis
Parthenogenesis
Parthenogenesis is a form of asexual reproduction found in females, where growth and development of embryos occur without fertilization by a male...
in insects. He also published work on medusae
Medusa (biology)
In biology, a medusa is a form of cnidarian in which the body is shaped like an umbrella, in contrast with polyps. Medusae vary from bell-shaped to the shape of a thin disk, scarcely convex above and only slightly concave below...
, other cestodes
Cestoda
This article describes the flatworm. For the medical condition, see Tapeworm infection.Cestoda is the name given to a class of parasitic flatworms, commonly called tapeworms, of the phylum Platyhelminthes. Its members live in the digestive tract of vertebrates as adults, and often in the bodies...
and trematodes
Trematoda
Trematoda is a class within the phylum Platyhelminthes that contains two groups of parasitic flatworms, commonly referred to as "flukes".-Taxonomy and biodiversity:...
, and strepsiptera
Strepsiptera
The Strepsiptera are an order of insects with ten families making up about 600 species...
ns...
His collection of worm specimens was purchased for the Helminth Collection of the Natural History Museum
Natural History Museum
The Natural History Museum is one of three large museums on Exhibition Road, South Kensington, London, England . Its main frontage is on Cromwell Road...
in London in 1851. His fish collection (1804-1855), specializing in freshwater fishes of Bavaria
Bavaria
Bavaria, formally the Free State of Bavaria is a state of Germany, located in the southeast of Germany. With an area of , it is the largest state by area, forming almost 20% of the total land area of Germany...
, was deposited at the Zoological Cabinet of the Bavarian State in 1863, and though most were lost in WWII, some specimens remain at the Zoologische Staatssammlung in Munich.
Principal publications
- Observationes de Salamandris et Tritonibus (1828)
- Beiträge zur Naturgeschichte der wirbellosen Thiere (Contributions to the natural history of invertebrates; Danzig, 1839)
- Lehrbuch der vergleichenden Anatomie der Wirbellossen Thiere (Manual of comparative anatomy of invertebrates; Berlin, 1845), being the first volume of Lehrbuch der Vergleichenden Anatomie (Manual of comparative anatomy; edited by C. T. E. von Siebold and H. Stannius, 1845-48)
- Ueber die Band- und Blasenwürmer (1854)
- Wahre Parthenogenesis bei Schmetterlingen und Bienen (True parthenogenesis in moths and bees; 1856; English trans. 1857)
- Die Süsswasserfische Mitteleuropas (Freshwater fish of Central Europe; Leipzig, 1863) Here he points out some of the hybrid forms.
- Beiträge zur Parthenogenesis der Arthropoden (Contributions on the parthenogenesis of Arthropods; 1871) Here he established the fact of parthenogenesis in two wasps, in a saw fly, in several mothMothA moth is an insect closely related to the butterfly, both being of the order Lepidoptera. Moths form the majority of this order; there are thought to be 150,000 to 250,000 different species of moth , with thousands of species yet to be described...
s, and in certain phyllopod crustacea.
Animals named after Siebold
- Enhydris sieboldiEnhydris sieboldiSiebold's Water Snake is a species of snake found in north-central India, Bangladesh, and western Malaysia.This snake has the upper parts covered in large blotches similar to those of a python but they are distinctive in having their nostrils on the top of the snout to aid their aquatic lifestyle....
Schlegel, 1837 or Siebold's Water Snake - Ergasilus sieboldi von Nordmann, 1832
- Lineola sieboldii (Kölliker, 1845) Gerlach & Riemann, 1974
- Pegantha sieboldi (Haeckel, 1879)
- Trichosphaerium sieboldi Schneider, 1878
- Stenostomum sieboldi von Graff, 1878
- Colobomatus sieboldi (Richiardi, 1877)
- Hyalonema sieboldi Gray, 1835
Source: Hans G. Hansson, Biographical Etymology of Marine Organism Names, Tjärnö Marine Biol. Lab., Sweden.