Karl Bogislaus Reichert


Karl Bogislaus Reichert was a German anatomist, embryologist and histologist.

Biography

Reichert was born in Rastenburg, East Prussia. From 1831 he studied at the University of Konigsberg, where he was a student of embryologist Karl Ernst Baer, then continued his education in Berlin under Friedrich Schlemm and Johannes Peter Müller. In 1836 he received his doctorate with a dissertation on the gill arches of vertebrate embryos. Afterwards, he worked as an intern at the Charité, and from 1839 to 1843, served as an assistant and prosector at the University of Berlin.
In 1843 he attained the chair of anatomy at the University of Dorpat, and ten years later, succeeded Karl Theodor Ernst von Siebold as professor of physiology at the University of Breslau. In 1858 he returned to Berlin as chair of anatomy, where he succeeded his former mentor, Johannes Peter Müller.
Reichert is remembered for his work in embryology, and for his pioneer research in cell theory. With Ernst Gaupp, he was co-architect of the Reichert–Gaupp theory concerning the origin of mammalian ossicles of the ear. His name is lent to the eponymous "Reichert's cartilage", described as a cartilaginous structure in the second branchial arch from which develop the temporal styloid processes, the stylohyoid ligaments, and the lesser cornu of the hyoid bone.

Written works