The laws of heredity were discovered by Gregor Mendel in about 1856-1863. Mendel conducted experiments in plant hybridization, collecting the results of cross-fertilizing hundreds of edible pea plants.

The results from Mendel's experiments confirmed his ideas about heredity: the law of segregation, which has become known as Mendel's First Law, and the law of independent assortment, also known as Mendel's Second Law.

The portrait opposite is of Gregor Mendel (1822 - 1884)