Van Tiegheim, Phillipe (1839–1914)

French botanist and biologist who defined the plant as having three distinct parts, the stem, the root, and the leaf, and studied the origin and differentiation of each type of plant tissue. His best known research included studies of the gross anatomy of the phanerogams (plants with reproductive organs) and the cryptogams (plants without reproductive organs, such as mosses and ferns).

Van Tiegheim was born in Bailleul, Nord, France. As an orphan, he was brought up by his aunt and uncle and, in 1856, he went to Bailleul College, where he obtained his baccalaureate in science. In 1858, he moved to the Ecole Normale Supérieure, and obtained a position as a teacher of botany and mineralogy there 1861. He went on to work with Louis Pasteur in Paris on the principles of fermentation.

He held a succession of academic posts in France: professor of botany at the Ecole Normale Supérieure 1864, professor and administrator at the Museum of Natural History 1879, and professor of biology at the Ecole Centrale des Arts et Manufactures 1873. From 1885–1912, he was the professor at the Ecole Normale Supérieure des Jeunes Filles, and was professor of plant biology at the Institut Agronomique 1898–1914.