Nikolai Vavilov

Nikolai Vavilov was a Russian and Soviet botanist and geneticist who collected crop diversity worldwide and proposed geographic centers of origin for cultivated plants.

Center of origin: A geographic region where a cultivated species was first domesticated or developed. Vavilov proposed regions where crops originated and diversified.
Vavilovian mimicry: The evolution of weed traits that resemble crop plants, reducing their removal during harvesting. Vavilov identified this form of natural selection in weeds associated with cultivated crops.
Vavilov Institute of Plant Industry: A Russian research institution founded in 1894 that maintains a major collection of plant genetic resources. Vavilov led the institute and built its seed collection through international expeditions.
Nikolai Vavilov's seed collection: A collection of crop seeds and other plant material assembled by Vavilov's institute for research and breeding. It preserved diversity that Vavilov's expeditions had documented and gathered.
Crop wild relative: A wild plant related to a domesticated crop that can provide useful genetic traits. Wild relatives helped reveal the diversity and ancestry of crops Vavilov studied.
Law of homologous series in variation: A principle that related species show parallel patterns of inherited variation. Vavilov used recurring variation across related crops to predict traits not yet documented.
Nikolai Vavilov's expeditions: A series of journeys in which Vavilov and colleagues collected cultivated plants and their relatives across many regions. These journeys supplied much of the comparative material behind his crop-origin research.
Trofim Lysenko: A Soviet agronomist whose political influence helped suppress genetics in the Soviet Union. Lysenko's campaign against geneticists contributed to Vavilov's removal, arrest, and death in prison.
Plant genetic resources: Heritable plant material used or potentially useful for research, breeding, and conservation. Vavilov's collections became a major resource for plant breeding and genetic research.
Geographic distribution of crops: The spatial pattern of cultivated plants and their diversity across regions. Comparing crop distributions helped Vavilov identify areas of concentrated variation.

Linked from 3 pages