Edith Rebecca Saunders: The Mother of British Plant Genetics
Using plant genetics to improve human health
In 1884, Edith Rebecca Saunders left her Birmingham, England home to study on scholarship at Newnham College—a part of the University of Cambridge. Little did she know that this decision would launch a barrier-breaking career, establish her as a preeminent geneticist and plant anatomist, and, ultimately, give her an active role in bringing Mendel’s Law of heredity back to life.
While at Cambridge, Dr. Saunders studied hard and rose to the top of her class. But despite earning First Class Honours in the Natural Sciences Tripos—a grueling exam that qualified students for a Bachelor’s degree—she only received a certificate. This was typical, as women were not allowed to obtain a degree, graduate, or even be considered part of the University until 1948—a full 60 years later. Still, with only a certificate in hand, and no access to the lectures and lab experiences enjoyed by men, Dr. Saunders refused to give up her dream of becoming a scientist.
Fortunately, renowned geneticist William Bateson had graduated from Cambridge two years earlier and recognized Dr. Saunders’s exceptional talent—a rare acknowledgement from a man and one that helped affirm her reputation as an equal. This led Dr. Saunders to become one of the few women to not only study at Cambridge, but to gain employment in a male-dominated field—one prone to relegating women to teaching or, at best, serving as research assistants.
As a research scientist, Dr. Saunders analyzed plant anatomy, focusing primarily on the gynoecia, the female reproductive organs of flowers—an area no other botanist had yet explored. She developed several theories about plant reproduction and trait heredity, which she compiled in her two-volume Floral Morphology (1937-1939). While some of her theories became generally accepted, others did not. Still, her plant-breeding experiments lent critical contributions to genetics, prompting respected scientist, JBS Haldane, to dub her ‘the mother of plant genetics.’
Perhaps Dr. Saunders’ most important contribution was collaborating with Bateson to popularize Mendel’s Law and its theories on heredity. Though Bateson would end up receiving most of the credit for their work, the pair would go on to co-found The Genetics Society and continue collaborating on a multitude of research projects until Bateson’s death in 1926.
Helping Pave the Way for Women
Though her primary focus was research, Dr. Saunders was also an excellent teacher and served as the director of the Balfour Biological Laboratory for Women—a center established to help women prepare for the Tripos exams, and provide them with the practical lab experience not previously available to women.
Dr. Saunders was also one of the first women elected as a Fellow of the Linnean Society (1905), and she was awarded the Royal Horticulture Society Banksian Medal (1906). In addition to serving as director of the Genetic Society (1936 to 1938), she was active in the British Association for the Advancement of Science.
An Astounding Life Cut Short
When World War II began, Dr. Saunders temporarily put her work on hold to volunteer as an aid to the Allied war effort. Sadly, she was killed in a bicycle accident shortly after resuming her research in 1945. Although Dr. Saunders was unable to see her work through to the end, her research has contributed to modern medicine’s ability to predict and understand genetic disorders, such as cystic fibrosis and Huntington’s disease.
Dr. Edith Rebecca Saunders was a true pioneer, and it’s no exaggeration to say that her grit and determination not only changed our understanding of genetics, but helped push the world of medicine forward.
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