Friedrich Adalbert Maximilian Kuhn

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Friedrich Adalbert Maximilian Kuhn (born September 3, 1842 in Berlin , † December 13, 1894 in Berlin-Friedenau ) was a German botanist . Frequently also written Maximilian Friedrich Adalbert Kuhn or Maximilian (Max) Kuhn. Its botanical author abbreviation is " Kuhn ".

Life

Kuhn passed his Abitur in 1862 at the Cologne High School in Berlin. He completed his studies in natural sciences in Berlin, where Johannes von Hanstein , Hermann Karsten , and above all Alexander Braun taught him botany.

As a student in 1865, he took part in a botanical research trip to the Carpathian Mountains under the direction of Paul Friedrich August Ascherson , the scientific results of which he edited and recorded in a report of the negotiations of the Botanical Association of the Province of Brandenburg from 1865. These records have not yet been printed or published.

In the meantime Kuhn had developed into a recognized authority in the field of fern science , so that in 1866, after the death of the fern researcher Georg Heinrich Mettenius, his father-in-law Alexander Braun entrusted him with the organization of his scientific estate. This is how the Reliquiae Mettenianae published by Kuhn in the 35th and 36th volumes of Linnaea (1867/68) came about . At the same time, he was left to work on the rich collection of ferns brought back by an expedition to Africa led by Baron Karl Klaus von der Betten . Kuhn published the first results in his dissertation from 1867: Filices ceilingianae , while in the following year he summarized the much larger part in the Filices Africanae . This catalog of all previously known African cryptogams has remained Kuhn's most extensive work in his specialty. After two years of assistant work at the royal herbarium in Berlin, Kuhn passed his examination for the higher teaching post in December 1868. After the probationary year, he was employed as a teacher at what was then the Königstädtische Realschule in Berlin in 1870 and became a senior teacher in 1879, and finally professor in 1889. Due to his many years of heart disease, his health deteriorated to such an extent that he had to submit his retirement in 1893 at the age of 51. An amputation of his right lower leg carried out to alleviate the deterioration of his illness could not stop, however, and so he succumbed to a heart attack in 1894 on his rural property near Berlin.

In addition to the fern collections already mentioned, Kuhn also worked on various others from tropical regions, such as those collected by Friedrich Carl Naumann on the journey of the SMS Gazelle during the years 1874–76. A list of his publications can be found in Paul Ascherson's obituary below . Kuhn's extensive Farnherbar along with his handwritten legacies and some of his books were donated by his widow to the Berlin Botanical Museum.

Works

  • Filices ceilingianae . Edited by Breitkopf & Haertel, Leipzig 1867, 26 pp.
  • Reliquiae Mettenianae . In: Linnaea Berlin: A journal for botany in its entirety . Ed. August Garcke, Vol. 35, Berlin 1867/1868: 385–394 and Vol. 36, 1869/1870: 41–169.
  • Filices Africanae. Ed. W. Engelmann, Leipzig 1868, 233 p., 1 plate.
  • Filices novarum Hebridarum . Vienna 1869, 18 pp.
  • Contributions to the Mexican fern flora . Edited by Schmidt, Halle 1869, 25 pp.

literature

Web links

personal data
SURNAME Kuhn, Friedrich Adalbert Maximilian
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Kuhn (botanical author abbreviation)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German botanist
DATE OF BIRTH September 3, 1842
PLACE OF BIRTH Berlin
DATE OF DEATH December 13, 1894
Place of death Berlin-Friedenau