Albert Francis Blakeslee (redirected from Blakeslee, Albert)

Blakeslee, Albert Francis 

Born Nov. 9, 1874, in Geneseo, N. Y.; died Nov. 16,1954, in Northampton, Mass. American botanist and geneticist.

Blakeslee graduated from Wesleyan University in 1896. He served as director of the Genetics Experiment Station at Smith College in Northampton from 1943. His fundamental works involved the study of gene balance, chromosomal mutations, and species formation on a new (for geneticists) plant object—the thorn apple (Datura stramonium). In 1937, in collaboration with O. T. Avery, he discovered a method for producing polyploidic mutations in plants by the action upon them of the alkaloid colchicine. He was a pioneer in the method of cultivating plant embryos.

A. E. GAISINOVICH