Hermann Merxmüller

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Hermann Merxmüller (born August 30, 1920 in Munich ; † February 8, 1988 there ) was a German botanist and doctor. Its official botanical author's abbreviation is “ Merxm. "

Live and act

Merxmüller took an early interest in the local flora, studied biology and especially botany at the Ludwig Maximilians University in Munich after his military service in World War II from 1946 and received his doctorate in 1951 on plant geography in the Alps. He then went to the Bavarian Botanical State Collection and worked as assistant to director Karl Suessenguth with the flora of Namibia , which he first visited in 1957 and then several times. From 1955 he was conservator, from 1956 director and (after working at the Free University of Berlin and the University of Zurich) from 1958 director of the State Botanical Collection and was associate professor for systematic botany at the LMU Munich, where he was temporarily dean of the natural science faculty . In addition, he was director of the Botanical Garden in Munich from 1969 . In 1985 he retired because he was severely visually impaired due to diabetes.

He dealt with the genus Hieracium and the family of Compositae , set out in his composite studies (11 volumes, 1950 to 1984). He discovered more than 100 new species of flowering plants in Africa. In addition to Africa, his focus was on alpine and Mediterranean flora. In Namibia he worked with the botanist Willy Giess, who from 1968 published the journal Dinteria on the flora of Namibia, and with many other South African botanists.

Honors

Many species and especially the genus Merxmuellera Conert from the sweet grass family (Poaceae) are named after him.

In 1965 he was elected a member of the Leopoldina and the Bavarian Academy of Sciences . Since 1937 he was a member of the Bavarian Botanical Society and its honorary president. He received the Jubilee Medal of the National Botanical Gardens of South Africa.

Fonts

  • with Gustav Hegi: Alpine flora: the more important alpine plants of Bavaria, Austria and Switzerland, 24th edition, Parey 1976
  • with Karl Suessenguth a. a .: Prodromus of a flora from South West Africa, 1966 to 1972
  • with Heinrich Nothdurft: Herbs and Perennials, Richard Kräusel (Ed.), Central European Plant World, Volume 1, Hamburg, Kronenverlag, 2nd edition, 1957
  • Shrubs and Trees, Central European Plant World, Volume 3, Kronenverlag, 3rd edition 1960

He was co-editor of the progress of botany in Springer Verlag.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Lotte Burkhardt: Directory of eponymous plant names - Extended Edition. Part I and II. Botanic Garden and Botanical Museum Berlin , Freie Universität Berlin , Berlin 2018, ISBN 978-3-946292-26-5 doi: 10.3372 / epolist2018 .
  2. ^ Member entry by Hermann Merxmüller (with picture) at the German Academy of Natural Scientists Leopoldina , accessed on February 18, 2016.
  3. ↑ Member entry by Hermann Merxmüller (with picture) at the Bavarian Academy of Sciences , accessed on February 18, 2016.
personal data
SURNAME Merxmüller, Hermann
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German botanist
DATE OF BIRTH August 30, 1920
PLACE OF BIRTH Munich
DATE OF DEATH February 8, 1988
Place of death Munich