HISTORICAL BACKGROUND OF CELL

CELL DISCOVERY

The word cell is derived from latin word ‘cellula’ which means ‘a little room’. While examining thin slice of cork, Robert Hooke in 1665 discovered honey comb like structure called Cells. Cork is a substance which comes from bark of a tree.

HISTORICAL BACKGROUND OF CELL

• 1665 – Robert Hooke discovered cell and coined the term cellula.
• 1673-1674 – Antonny Von Leeuwenhoek observed bacteria, spermatozoa, RBCs etc.
• 1682 – Malpighi and Grew laid the foundation of cell concept by writing anatomy of plants wherein they described that tissues contain minute elementary structure (or cells).
• 1772 – Alfonso Corti observed living matter in the cells.
• 1781 – F. Fontana discovered nucleolus in skin cell of eel.
• 1802 – C.F. Mirbel observed that plants are formed by membranous cellular tissue.
• 1809 – J.B. Lamarck – No body can have life if its constituent parts are not formed of cells.
• 1824 – R.J.H. Dutrochet boiled Mimosa tissues in nitric acid and inferred that “tissues are really globular cells of an extreme smallness which are united by cohesion”.
• 1831 – Robert Brown discovered nucleus in cells of Orchid root.
• 1835 – Dujardin discovered living semi fluid substance of cells and named it sarcode.
• 1838-1839 – M.J. Schleiden and Theodore Schwann propounded cell theory.
• 1839 – J.E. Purkinje coin the term protoplasm (supported by Von Mohl)