Friedrich Hustedt was a German

Germany

Germany , officially the Federal Republic of Germany , is a federal parliamentary republic in Europe. The country consists of 16 states while the capital and largest city is Berlin. Germany covers an area of 357,021 km2 and has a largely temperate seasonal climate...

 teacher and botanist, best known for his diatom

Diatom

Diatoms are a major group of algae, and are one of the most common types of phytoplankton. Most diatoms are unicellular, although they can exist as colonies in the shape of filaments or ribbons , fans , zigzags , or stellate colonies . Diatoms are producers within the food chain...

 systematics

Systematics

Biological systematics is the study of the diversification of terrestrial life, both past and present, and the relationships among living things through time. Relationships are visualized as evolutionary trees...

 research.

He was born and grew up in Bremen

Bremen

The City Municipality of Bremen is a Hanseatic city in northwestern Germany. A commercial and industrial city with a major port on the river Weser, Bremen is part of the Bremen-Oldenburg metropolitan area . Bremen is the second most populous city in North Germany and tenth in Germany.Bremen is...

, Germany. He taught school for 32 years, in 1924 becoming the head teacher of the school at Hauffstraße in Bremen. Hustedt initially pursued his interest in diatoms as a hobby

Hobby

A hobby is a regular activity or interest that is undertaken for pleasure, typically done during one's leisure time.- Etymology :A hobby horse is a wooden or wickerwork toy made to be ridden just like a real horse...

, but his standing in the scientific community grew rapidly; thus, in 1939 he left school to study diatoms full-time. He described over 2000 diatom taxa and eventually amassed the largest private diatom collection in the world.