Heinrich Moritz Willkomm (From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia) Heinrich Moritz Willkomm (29 June 1821, Herwigsdorf – 26 August 1895, Schloss Wartenberg in Wartenberg am Rollberg, Bohemia) was a German academic and botanist. The standard author abbreviation Willk. is used to indicate this person as the author when citing a botanical name.[1] He studied medicine at the University of Leipzig, later being named a professor of natural history in Tharandt (1855). In 1868 he was appointed professor of botany and director of the botanical garden at the University of Dorpat, and from 1874 to 1892, maintained similar roles at the University of Prague.[2] In 1844–45 and 1850–51, he collected plants in Spain and Portugal. His main herbarium from these expeditions is kept in Coimbra and his personal herbarium was taken to Genoa. Following his tenure at Dorpat, he embarked on a scientific excursion to the Balearic Islands.[2] His book Die Wunder des Mikroskops ("The Miracles of the Microscope"; 1856, 4th ed. 1878) contributed to the growing movement to popularize science in Germany.[3] The grass genus Willkommia (family Poaceae) is named in his honor.[4] Written works - Willkomm's "Grundzüge der Pflanzenverbreitung auf der Iberischen Halbinsel" (Outline of plant distribution in the Iberian Peninsula) was included in Engler and Drude's "Die Vegetation der Erde".[5][6] Among his numerous written efforts are the following: - Zwei Jahre in Spanien und Portugal (1847) - Sertum floræ hispanicæ (1852) - Wanderungen durch die nordöstlichen und centralen Provinzen Spaniens (1852) - Die Strand- und Steppengebiete der iberischen Halbinsel und deren Vegetation (1852) - Die Halbinsel der Pyrenäen (1855) - Die Wunder des Mikroskops oder die Welt im kleinsten Raum (1856, several editions). - Icones et descriptiones plantarum... Europæ austro-occidentalis, præcipue Hispaniæ (two volumes, 168 illustrations, (1852–56). - Prodromus florae hispanicae (1861-1880, supplement 1893), with Johan Lange. - Die mikroskopischen Feinde des Waldes (1866–67) - Mikroskopets under eller en verld i det minsta; Stockholm : Em. Girons, 1871, with A M Selling.[7] - Forstliche Flora von Deutschland und Oesterreich (1875, new edition 1887). Spanien und die Balearen (1876)