Sewall Wright

Sewall Green Wright FRS(For) Honorary FRSE was an American geneticist known for his influential work on evolutionary theory and also for his work on path analysis. He was a founder of population genetics alongside Ronald Fisher and J. B. S. Haldane, which was a major step in the development of the modern synthesis combining genetics with evolution. He discovered the inbreeding coefficient and methods of computing it in pedigree animals. He extended this work to populations, computing the amount of inbreeding between members of populations as a result of random genetic drift, and along with Fisher he pioneered methods for computing the distribution of gene frequencies among populations as a result of the interaction of natural selection, mutation, migration and genetic drift. Wright also made major contributions to mammalian and biochemical genetics.

21 December 1889

Born on the same birth day (21 December): Betty Wright • Cristian Zaccardo • Cécile DeWitt-Morette • Govinda (actor) • Hanif Mohammad • Jeffrey Katzenberg • John Bradstreet • John H. Ketcham • Joseph Carruthers • Kaitlyn Dever • Khris Davis • Lillebjørn Nilsen • Max Maven • Namık Kemal • Ray Romano • Steven Yeun • Tamannaah Bhatia • Thomas Bracken • Thomas Sankara

Born in the same month (December 1889): George Hutson • Hannes Kolehmainen • Kim Chwa-chin • Lila Acheson Wallace • Ragnhild Kaarbø • Walter Knott