Ruprekht, Frants Ivanovich

Born Nov. 1, 1814, in Freiburg; died July 23 (Aug. 4), 1870, in St. Petersburg. Russian botanist. Member of the St. Petersburg Academy of Sciences (1853).

In 1836, Ruprekht graduated from the University of Prague. He settled in Russia in 1839, working first as an employee and later (from 1855) as director of the Botanical Museum of the St. Petersburg Academy of Sciences. He traveled in the northern European part of Russia in 1841 and in the Caucasus in 1860–61. Ruprekht’s principal works were devoted to the algae of the Pacific Ocean; higher plants in various regions of Russia; and the taxonomy of Gramineae, Umbelliferae, Primulaceae, and Campanulaceae. In Geobotanical Investigations of Chernozem (1866) he substantiated the connection between the formation of chernozem with steppe vegetation.