| Albert Francis Blakeslee | |
| Birth Date: | November 9, 1874 |
| Birth Place: | Geneseo, New York |
| Death Place: | Northampton, Massachusetts |
| Field: | Botany |
| Work Institutions: | Carnegie Institution, Smith College |
| Education: | Wesleyan University, Harvard University (Ph.D.), University of Halle-Wittenberg |
| Doctoral Students: | Kathleen Margaret Cole |
| Known For: | Use of jimsonweed as a model organism |
| Relatives: | George Hubbard Blakeslee (brother) |
| Father: | Francis Durbin Blakeslee |
| Mother: | Augusta Miranda Hubbard Blakeslee |
| Spouse: | Margaret Dickson Bridges |
| Author Abbrev Bot: | Blakeslee |
| Prizes: | Bowdoin Prize |
Albert Francis Blakeslee (November 9, 1874 – November 16, 1954) was an American botanist. He is best known for his research on the poisonous jimsonweed plant and the sexuality of fungi. He was the brother of the Far East scholar George Hubbard Blakeslee.
Albert Francis Blakeslee was born on November 9, 1874, in Geneseo, New York, to Augusta Miranda Hubbard Blakeslee and Francis Durbin Blakeslee, a Methodist minister.[1]
Blakeslee attended Wesleyan University, graduating in 1896. At Wesleyan, Blakeslee played several sports and won academic prizes in mathematics and chemistry.
He received a master's degree from Harvard University in 1900 and a doctorate in 1904. He also studied at the University of Halle-Wittenberg in Germany from 1904 to 1906.[2]
After graduating from Wesleyan, Blakeslee taught at the Montpelier Seminary in Vermont, as well as at the East Greenwich Academy.
His first professorship was at the Connecticut Agricultural College, now known as the University of Connecticut. He was hired by the Carnegie Institution in 1915, eventually becoming its director.
In 1941, Blakeslee retired from the Carnegie Institution and returned to academia, accepting a professorship at Smith College. He would go on to direct the Smith College Genetics Experimentation Station.
At Smith, he performed his research on jimsonweed. Blakeslee used the jimsonweed plant as a model organism for his genetic research. His experiments included using colchicine to achieve an increase in the number of chromosomes, which opened up a new field of research,[3] creating artificial polyploids and aneuploids, and studying the phenotypic effects of polyploidy and of individual chromosomes.
Blakeslee married Margaret Dickson Bridges in 1919.
Blakeslee died in Northampton, Massachusetts, on November 16, 1954. He was 80 years old.
Blakeslee was awarded the Bowdoin Prize for this discovery of sexual fusion in fungi.
He was elected to the American Philosophical Society in 1924,[4] the United States National Academy of Sciences in 1929,[5] and the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 1940.[6]