Gregor Mendel
Gregor Mendel played a huge role in the underlying principles of genetic inheritance. Gregor was born, July 22 1822 in Heinzendorf, Austrian Silesia (now known as Hyncice, Czech Republic), with the name Johann Mendel. He changed his name to Gregor in 1843. ... After 3 years of theological studies, Mendel went to the University of Vienna, where 2 professors influenced him; the physicist Doppler and a botanist named Unger. ... Mendel died January 6 1884. In 1857, Mendel began breeding garden peas in the abbey garden to study inheritance, which lead to his law of Segregation and independent assortment. Mendel observed several characteristics of the garden peas which include: plant height (tallness/shortness), seed color (green/yellow), seed shape (smooth/wrinkled), seed-coat color (gray/white), pod shape (full/constricted), pod color (green/yellow), and flower distribution (along length/ at end of stem). Mendel keep careful records of his experiments and first reported his findings at a meeting of the Brunn Natural History Society. ... In 1868 Mendel was promoted to abbot at the monastery and gave up his experiments. ... They credited Gregor Mendel as the discoverer of the laws of heredity. ... The theories of heredity attributed to Gregor Mendel, based on his work with pea plants, is well known to any student of biology. ... The short monograph, "Experiments with Plant Hybrids," in which Mendel described how traits were inherited, has become one of the most enduring and influential publications in the history of science.