1861-1926

English Biologist

William Bateson was one of the scientists who, at the turn of the twentieth century, expanded the views of evolution and helped to describe the force of heredity and variation. He promoted the ideas contained in the newly rediscovered paper by Gregor Mendel (1822-1884) about inheritance of characters, and applied those ideas to Darwinian evolution. Bateson also coined the term "genetics," and conducted a wide range of experiments that broadened understanding in this area.

Bateson was born on August 8, 1861, in Whitby, Yorkshire, England. Throughout his childhood, he maintained a limited interest in the natural world, considerably different from his father, who was a classics scholar at St. John's College in Cambridge. The young Bateson enrolled at St. John's in 1879. His childhood interests came to the forefront three years later when he won an honors examination in the natural sciences. While studying for that...