| Title |
Spontaneous Generation and Disease Causation: Anton de Bary’s Experiments with Phytophthora infestans and Late Blight of Potato
|
|---|---|
| Published in |
Journal of the History of Biology, December 2009
|
| DOI | 10.1007/s10739-009-9220-1 |
| Pubmed ID | |
| Authors |
Christina Matta |
| Abstract |
Anton de Bary is best known for his elucidation of the life cycle of Phytopthora infestans, the causal organism of late blight of potato and the crop losses that caused famine in nineteenth-century Europe. But while practitioner histories often claim this accomplishment as a founding moment of modern plant pathology, closer examination of de Bary's experiments and his published work suggest that his primary motiviation for pursing this research was based in developmental biology, not agriculture. De Bary shied away from making any recommendations for agricultural practice, and instead focused nearly exclusively on spontaneous generation and fungal development - both concepts promoted through prize questions posted by the Académie des Sciences in the 1850s and 1860s. De Bary's submission to the Académie's 1859 Alhumbert prize question illustrates his own contributions to debates about spontaneous generation and demonstrates the practical applications of seemingly philosophical questions - such as the origin of life. |
X Demographics
The data shown below were collected from the profile of 1 X user who shared this research output. Click here to find out more about how the information was compiled.
Geographical breakdown
| Country | Count | As % |
|---|---|---|
| Unknown | 1 | 100% |
Demographic breakdown
| Type | Count | As % |
|---|---|---|
| Members of the public | 1 | 100% |
Mendeley readers
The data shown below were compiled from readership statistics for 22 Mendeley readers of this research output. Click here to see the associated Mendeley record.
Geographical breakdown
| Country | Count | As % |
|---|---|---|
| Unknown | 22 | 100% |
Demographic breakdown
| Readers by professional status | Count | As % |
|---|---|---|
| Student > Ph. D. Student | 4 | 18% |
| Student > Bachelor | 3 | 14% |
| Researcher | 3 | 14% |
| Professor > Associate Professor | 3 | 14% |
| Student > Master | 2 | 9% |
| Other | 2 | 9% |
| Unknown | 5 | 23% |
| Readers by discipline | Count | As % |
|---|---|---|
| Agricultural and Biological Sciences | 12 | 55% |
| Biochemistry, Genetics and Molecular Biology | 3 | 14% |
| Computer Science | 1 | 5% |
| Social Sciences | 1 | 5% |
| Unknown | 5 | 23% |
Attention Score in Context
This research output has an Altmetric Attention Score of 1. This is our high-level measure of the quality and quantity of online attention that it has received. This Attention Score, as well as the ranking and number of research outputs shown below, was calculated when the research output was last mentioned on 14 December 2013.
All research outputs
#15,288,160
of 22,736,112 outputs
Outputs from Journal of the History of Biology
#403
of 483 outputs
Outputs of similar age
#134,249
of 163,722 outputs
Outputs of similar age from Journal of the History of Biology
#3
of 3 outputs
Altmetric has tracked 22,736,112 research outputs across all sources so far. This one is in the 22nd percentile – i.e., 22% of other outputs scored the same or lower than it.
So far Altmetric has tracked 483 research outputs from this source. They typically receive a little more attention than average, with a mean Attention Score of 5.8. This one is in the 12th percentile – i.e., 12% of its peers scored the same or lower than it.
Older research outputs will score higher simply because they've had more time to accumulate mentions. To account for age we can compare this Altmetric Attention Score to the 163,722 tracked outputs that were published within six weeks on either side of this one in any source. This one is in the 8th percentile – i.e., 8% of its contemporaries scored the same or lower than it.
We're also able to compare this research output to 3 others from the same source and published within six weeks on either side of this one.