José Mariano Mociño

José Mariano Mociño
Born	1757 Temascaltepec, New Spain
Died	12 June 1820 Barcelona, Spain
Nationality	New Spain
Other names	José Mariano Mociño Suárez Lozano
Occupation	Botanist

José Mariano Mociño Suárez Lozano (1757 – 12 June 1820), or simply José Mariano Mociño, was a naturalist from New Spain.

After having studied philosophy and medicine, he conducted early research on the ecology (especially botany), geology, and anthropology of his country and other parts of North America.

He was born in Temascaltepec (modern-day Mexico State) in 1757. Being poor, he worked in many different jobs to study in the Seminario Tridentino de México, where he devoted himself especially to physics, mathematics, botany, and chemistry. In 1778 he graduated in philosophy. In 1791 he was called to join the scientific expedition of Martín de Sessé, the Royal Botanical Expedition, which had started in 1787. They traveled across New Spain, reaching the most inhospitable places of the Empire, being especially notable his trips to the Pacific Northwest (modern-day U.S. states of California, Oregon, Washington and Alaska, and the Canadian province of British Columbia), among others. Although the pay for his job was minimal, he created one of the most important natural history collections of his times.

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