Went, Friedrich August Ferdinand Christian

Born June 16, 1863, in Amsterdam; died July 24, 1935, in Wassenaar. Dutch plant physiologist.

A student of De Vries, Went graduated from the botany section of the University of Amsterdam. In 1886 he defended his doctoral dissertation on the formation of vacuoles in plant cells. He continued his cytological research in the laboratories of Naples, Bonn, and Paris. In 1890 he became director of an agricultural station in the Buitenzorg Botanical Gardens in Java, where he investigated the physiology of tropical plants and discovered the nature of sugarcane diseases. Upon returning to the Netherlands, Went worked as a professor at the University of Utrecht from 1896 to 1934. From 1921 to 1931 he headed the botany section of the Netherlands Academy of Sciences. His studies of the breathing and growth of plants, the effects of temperature on their vital activities, tropisms, and growth hormones were continued by his son, F. V. Went.