The Discovery of Plants Cells in History
In the 17th century there was an English scientist by the name of
 Robert
Hooke who began studying the cork tree. During his observations, the
porous nature of the cork reminded him of the cells of a monastery,
hence his applying the term ‘cell’ to his personal biological
observations. The word cell is derived from the Latin word cella, which
literally translates into “The part enclosed within the walls of an
ancient temple, as distinguished from the open porticoes.” Hook applied
the word ‘cells’ to his initial observations of the cork tree but he
continued to study this biological plant in depth and managed to
document cellular structure for the first time in history.
Robert Hooke designed a compound microscope and an illumination
system that became the best of the best of his time.
 Compound
microscopes (microscopes that use more than one lens) were a relatively
new idea having been developed around 1595. He used his microscope
endlessly and demonstrated it with the Royal Society of London several
times. With his microscope, Hooke studied endlessly biological wonders
and documented everything he observed. In 1665 he published Micrographia
which became extremely popular. Within Micrographia are numerous and
highly detailed drawings of his findings, most importantly cellular
structure for the first time.
To the best of Robert Hooke’s knowledge, no one before him had ever
observed the “microscopical pores” he observed within the cork tissue.
In Micrographia he comments “…I could exceedingly plainly perceive it to
be all perforated and porous, much like a Honey-comb, but that the pores
of it were not regular. . . . these pores, or cells, . . . were indeed
the first microscopical pores I ever saw, and perhaps, that were ever
seen, for I had not met with any Writer or Person, that had made any
mention of them before this. . .” With this observation and
documentation, plant cells were discovered.
After Hooke’s discovery and documentation, others took up the task of
delving deeper into the mystery of plant cells.
What Hooke had observed was the cellular walls of dead cork tissue
and that was all. Cellular structure was more vividly discovered,
studied and documented by Anton Van Leeuwenhoek nine years after the
publication of Micrographia. Leeuwenhoek microscopically observed the
live cellular structure of Spirogyra, a type of algae, and was able to
provide documentation of his findings to the Royal Society of London. On
September 7, 1674, he drafted a letter to the Society about his
discovery of Spirogyra, stating that “Passing just lately over this
lake, . . . and examining this water next day, I found floating therein
divers earthy particles, and some green streaks, spirally wound
serpent-wise, and orderly arranged, after the manner of the copper or
tin worms, which distillers use to cool their liquors as they distil
over. The whole circumference of each of these streaks was about the
thickness of a hair of one's head. . . all consisted of very small green
globules joined together: and there were very many small green globules
as well.”
 Leeuwenhoek
is credited for building over 500 microscopes in his time and is well
credited with his participation in plant’s cellular discovery. Even
though his compound microscopes were much different than those of Robert
Hooke’s, he was able to achieve a much greater magnification from his
than Hooke ever was able to, thus allowing him to see and describe in
detail actual cellular structure rather than the simple observance of
cell walls alone.
In 1831 the nucleus of cellular structure was discovered by the
Scottish botanist, Robert Brown who also contributed the observation of
how the nucleus could be connected to cellular division. By 1838 the
cell theory was fully developed by German Scientist Matthias Schleiden,
German zoologist, Theodor Schwann and German biologist Rudolf Virchow.
“Cell theory refers to the idea that cells are the basic unit of
structure in all living things”.
The discovery of plant cells was an evolving discovery that involved
many men of science of the course of several years. |
