Konstantin Sergeevich Merezhkovskii

Merezhkovskii, Konstantin Sergeevich 

Born July 23 (Aug. 4), 1855, in St. Petersburg; died Jan. 10, 1921, in Geneva. Russian biologist. Brother of D. S. Merezhkovskii.

Merezhkovskii graduated from St. Petersburg University in 1880. He was a professor at the University of Kazan from 1902 to 1914. His works deal with botany (the morphology and taxonomy of diatoms and lichens), zoology (the taxonomy of infusoria, sponges, and coelenterates), and anthropology. A founder of the theory of symbiogenesis, Merezhkovskii proposed an original system of the organic world on the basis of this theory in which he divided the organic world into three kingdoms— mycoids (fungi, bacteria, and blue-green algae), plants, and animals. He also pointed out the evolutionary significance of neoteny and the oligomerization of organs.

WORKS

Teoriia dvukh plazm kak osnova simbiogenezisa, novogo ucheniia o proiskhozhdenii organizmov. Kazan, 1909.
Konspektivnyi kurs obshchei botaniki, part 1. Kazan, 1910.