Georges Ville

Georges Ville (1824 to 1897) was a French agronomist and plant physiologist, born at Pont-Saint-Esprit. He began as a pharmacy intern in 1843 and from 1857 until his death held the chair of vegetable physics at the Muséum national d'histoire naturelle in Paris. In experiments between 1849 and 1852 he argued that plants can absorb free nitrogen from the air, a claim that drew enough attention for the French Academy of Sciences to appoint a committee, which confirmed his experiments. He also carried out early, extensive studies of chemical fertilizers on the experimental farm he founded at Vincennes in 1860, and he published lectures and manuals on the subject, among them L'école des engrais chimiques in 1869.