Cell Theory Timeline

By Beams
  • 362 BCE

    Aristotle

    (supported Spontaneous Generation)
    He did a lot of things

  • Zacharias Jansen

    (rejected Spontaneous Generation)
    Invented the compound optical microscope

  • Robert Hooke

    (rejected Spontaneous Generation)
    He contributed to the discovery of cells while looking at a thin slice of cork.

  • Anton van Leeuwenhoek

    (rejected Spontaneous Generation)
    Observed bacteria and protozoa

  • Jan Baptist van Helmont

    (supported Spontaneous Generation)
    Said that mice appeared after a dirty shirt and wheat were placed together for 21 days

  • Lorenz Oken

    (rejected Spontaneous Generation) proposed the sea slime theory

  • Robert Brown

    (rejected Spontaneous Generation)
    Discovered the nucleus of the cell

  • Matthias Schleiden

    (supported Spontaneous Generation)
    Studied microscopic plant cells

  • Theodor Schwann

    (rejected spontaneous Generation)
    Discovered flies don’t come from meat unless the flies were already present

  • Albrecht von Roelliker

    (rejected Spontaneous Generation)
    Discovered that all things are composted of cells like sperm and eggs.

  • Rudolf Virchow

    (rejected Spontaneous Generation)
    Was a pathologist’s

  • Louis Pasteur

    (rejected Spontaneous Generation)
    Created vaccines and pasteurization