Francisco Orts Llorca facts for kids

Francisco Orts Llorca was a physician (a doctor), an anatomist (someone who studies the body's structure), and an embryologist (someone who studies how living things develop before birth). He was a professor of anatomy at the University of Madrid.

Early Life and Education

Francisco Orts Llorca was born in 1905 in Tampico, Mexico. His family was Spanish, and his father was a sailor. When he was three years old, his family moved to Benidorm in Spain.

He studied Medicine and Surgery at the University of Valencia and graduated in 1928. In 1935, he became the head of the anatomy department at the University of Cádiz.

A Life in Science

During the Spanish Civil War, Francisco Orts Llorca found safety in the Republican area. He learned from famous scientists like Henri Rouviére in Paris, Alfred Fischel in Vienna, Walter Vogt in Munich, and Pedro Ara Sarriá in Madrid.

Before the Spanish Civil War, his trips to study abroad were paid for by a group called the Board for the Expansion of Scientific Studies and Research. This group later built a special laboratory for him to study experimental embryology. He was appointed Professor of Anatomy at the University of Madrid.

Francisco Orts Llorca is known as one of the first and most important people in the field of anatomy in Spain, alongside Hermann Braus. He also started the field of experimental embryology, which involves studying how living things develop from their earliest stages, often through experiments. He passed away in 1993.

Awards and Recognition

Francisco Orts Llorca received several important awards:

• He was given an honorary degree (called a Doctor honoris causa) from the National University of Córdoba in Argentina.
• He also received an honorary degree from the University of Barcelona.
• In 1987, he was awarded the Cross of St. George, a special honor.

His Writings

Besides many research papers on embryology, Francisco Orts Llorca also published books, including:

• La fisiología del desarrollo y su importancia en biología (1956)
• Tratamiento del infarto cerebral (1979)

Training New Scientists

Francisco Orts Llorca created a large "anatomical school," which means he trained many students who became important anatomists themselves. At that time, only José Escolar García had a similar impact. Both of them greatly influenced the study of anatomy in Spain during the period of the Franco dictatorship and the move to democracy.

See also

In Spanish: Francisco Orts Llorca para niños