Schimper, Andreas Franz Wilhelm (1856–1901)

German botanist and plant geographer who classified the plant life in Africa according to the terrain and climate of the natural habitat, and in 1880, he showed for the first time that starch is an important form of stored energy in plants.

Schimper was born in Strasbourg (then in Germany) and educated at the University of Strasbourg, where he was influenced by Heinrich De Bary. He obtained a doctorate in natural philosophy 1878 and replaced his father as director of the Museum of Natural History 1880. He also went to Würzburg to work with Julius Sachs and travelled throughout America in the early 1880s. He was a fellow at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore. In 1882, he was made a lecturer and then a professor in physiological botany at the University of Bonn, where he worked with Edvard Strasburger.

He travelled to the West Indies, South America, Ceylon, Java, and Africa, where he contracted malaria, which was to plague him for the rest of his life. He also worked intensively to divide plant life according to the terrain and climate of the natural habitat. In 1899, his contribution to botanical research was recognized; he was made professor of botany at Basel University. He remained in Basel till his death.