Pierre Paul Déhérain

Pierre Paul Déhérain (1830 to 1902) was a French plant physiologist and agricultural chemist, born in Paris, who was the doctoral advisor of the Nobel laureate Henri Moissan. He began as an assistant at the Conservatoire national des arts et métiers, became a professor at the Collège Chaptal at the age of 26, and took his science degree in 1856 under Edmond Frémy. He later taught agricultural chemistry at the agricultural school at Grignon, became professor of plant physiology at the Muséum d'Histoire Naturelle in 1880 and was elected to the Académie des sciences in 1887. He studied the absorption of carbon dioxide by plants and the effect of artificial light, showed that plants absorb all the minerals available and use those they need, discovered respiration by plant roots, investigated the effect of minerals on the growth of fruits and studied the effect of crop rotation on soil quality. The plant genus Deherainia is named after him.