History of Cell Biology

• Cell biology

  The study of the structure and function of cells, the fundamental units of life
• Robert Hooke

  • English scientist
  • Devised one of the earliest microscopes
  • Observed a thin slice of cork from a bark of an oak tree
  • Named the porous surface "cellulae" (Latin for "small room")
  • These were actually dead hollow chambers, the wall left behind by dead plant cells
  • Wrote all his observations in the Micrographia
  • First to be credited in publishing of seeing cell
• Antoine van Leeuwenhoek


  • Dutch naturalist
  • First to study magnetized cells
  • Inspired by the Micrographia
  • Devised his own microscope
  • Detailed sketches of his objects were sent to Hooke and the Royal Society of London
  • Studied moving microscopic things in the water, called them animalcules (little animals)
  • Studied blood, semen, feces, pepper, and tartar
• Matthias Schleiden


  • German botanist
  • In 1838, found that plants are made from cells
  • Recognized importance of the cell nucleus and sensed its connection to cell division
• Theodor Schwann

  • German physiologist, close friend of Schleiden
  • In 1938, examined animal cells
  • Concluded that "all living things are composed of cells and cell products"
• Rudolf Carl Virchow


  • German physician
  • Proposed the last rule of the cell theory