History of Biology

History of Biology Last Few Century

As a science, biology did not develop until the last few centuries BC. Although hippocrates, known as the father of medicine, influence the development of medicine apart from the role in religion, it was Aristotle who established observation and analysis as the basic tools of biology.

From the 3rd century BC to the 2d century AD, studies primarily focused on agriculture and medicine. The Arabs dominated the study of biology during the middle ages and applied their knowledge of the Greeks discoveries to medicine.

The renaissance was a period of rapid advances. In the 15th and 16th centuries. Leonardo da Vinci and Michelangelo became skilled anatomists though their search for perfection in art, Andreas Vesallius initiated the use of dissection as a teaching aid. In the 17th century, William Harvey introduced the use of experimentation in his studies of the human circulatory system. His work marked the beginning of mammalian physiology.

Lack of communication was a problem for early biologists. To overcome this, scientific societies were organized. The first were in Europe, beginning with the Academy of the Lynx (Rome, 1603). The Boston Philosophical Society, founded in 1683, was probably the first such society to be organized in colonial America. Later, specialized groups organized themselves, among them the American Association for the Advancement of Sciences founded in 1848.

Another important development of the 17th century began with the invention of the microscope by Galileo Galilei about 1610. Microscopy originated in 1625 when the Italian Francesco Stelluti published his drawings of a honeybee magnified 10 times. The 17th century produced five microscopists whose works are considered classics.