Collection 

Celebrating Alfred Russel Wallace

Born 200 years ago, January 8th, 1823, in Wales, United Kingdom, Alfred Russel Wallace was a naturalist, explorer, geographer, anthropologist, biologist, and a man of many other talents. Wallace is famously known for conceiving the idea of evolution by natural selection independently of Charles Darwin. Wallace is also often considered the “father of biogeography”, after his extensive fieldwork and exciting discoveries in the Amazon River basin and the Malay Archipelago.

In celebration of this milestone, this Collection from the Nature Portfolio brings together articles that reflect on Wallace’s legacy and explore how his findings shape evolutionary and biogeographical research to this day.

Butterfly with black and electric-green wings, a Raja Brooke's Birdwing (Trogonoptera brookiana), resting on a flower. Butterfly species named by Alfred Russel Wallace and native to the Malay archipelago.