Alfred Russel Wallace

Alfred Russel Wallace was a naturalist and explorer who independently conceived the theory of evolution by natural selection, prompting Charles Darwin to publish his own work. Wallace is also considered the father of biogeography, having mapped the distribution of species across the globe and identified the 'Wallace Line,' which separates the fauna of Asia and Australia. His contributions to evolutionary theory and his extensive field research in the Amazon and the Malay Archipelago were groundbreaking. While often overshadowed by Darwin, Wallace's insights into natural selection and species distribution remain essential to modern biology.