Dr. Édouard Marie Heckel (March 24, 1843 – January 20, 1916) was a French

France

The French Republic , The French Republic , The French Republic , (commonly known as France , is a unitary semi-presidential republic in Western Europe with several overseas territories and islands located on other continents and in the Indian, Pacific, and Atlantic oceans. Metropolitan France...

 botanist and medical doctor, and director of the Jardin botanique E.M. Heckel

Jardin botanique E.M. Heckel

The Jardin botanique E.M. Heckel , also known as the Jardin botanique de Marseille and the Jardin botanique Borély de Marseille, is a municipal botanical garden located in the Parc Borély at 48, Avenue Clot Bey, Marseille, Bouches-du-Rhône, Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur, France...

 in Marseille.

Heckel was born in Toulon

Toulon

Toulon is a town in southern France and a large military harbor on the Mediterranean coast, with a major French naval base. Located in the Provence-Alpes-Côte-d'Azur region, Toulon is the capital of the Var department in the former province of Provence....

, studied pharmacy and medicine, and in 1861 visited the Caribbean

Caribbean

The Caribbean is a crescent-shaped group of islands more than 2,000 miles long separating the Gulf of Mexico and the Caribbean Sea, to the west and south, from the Atlantic Ocean, to the east and north...

 and Australia

Australia

Australia , officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country in the Southern Hemisphere comprising the mainland of the Australian continent, the island of Tasmania, and numerous smaller islands in the Indian and Pacific Oceans. It is the world's sixth-largest country by total area...

. In 1875 he was appointed professor in the faculty of sciences at Marseille

Marseille

Marseille , known in antiquity as Massalia , is the second largest city in France, after Paris, with a population of 852,395 within its administrative limits on a land area of . The urban area of Marseille extends beyond the city limits with a population of over 1,420,000 on an area of...

, and in 1877 professor of medicine. He became a professor of natural history in Nancy in 1878, and is known for his studies of tropical plants and their use as medicinal plants and oilseeds.