Berkeley was born at
Biggin Hall,
Benefield, Northamptonshire, and educated at
Rugby School and
Christ's College, Cambridge. Taking
holy orders, he became
incumbent of
Apethorpe in 1837, and vicar of
Sibbertoft, near
Market Harborough, in 1868. He acquired an enthusiastic love of
cryptogamic botany (
lichens) in his early years, and soon was recognized as the leading British authority on fungi and
plant pathology. Christ's College made him an honorary fellow in 1883. As a
microscopist he was an assiduous and accurate worker, as shown by his numerous drawings of the smaller
algae and fungi, and his admirable dissections of
mosses and
Hepaticae. His investigations on the potato murrain, caused by
Phytophthora infestans, on the
grape powdery mildew, to which he gave the name
Oidium tuckeri, and on the pathogenic fungi of
wheat rust,
hop mildew, and various diseases of
cabbage, pears, coffee, onions, tomatoes, and other plants, were important in results bearing on the life-history of these pests, at a time when very little was known of such matters, and must always be considered in any historical account of the remarkable advances in the biology of these organisms made between 1850 and 1880. When it is remembered that this work was done without any of the modern appliances or training of a properly equipped laboratory, the real significance of Berkeley's pioneering work becomes apparent. It has been said that As the founder of British mycology, his significant work is contained in the account of native British fungi in Sir
William Jackson Hooker's
British Flora (1836), in his
Introduction to Cryptogamic Botany (1857), and in his
Outlines of British Fungology (1860). His herbarium at the
Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, is one of the world's most extensive, containing over 9000 specimens as well as numerous notes and sketches. Between 1836 and 1843 Berkeley issued the
exsiccata British fungi... Berkeley was one of the most prolific authors of new fungal species, having
formally described about 5300 in his career. Berkeley corresponded with
Anna Maria Hussey assisting her with identifying specimens while she supplied specimens she had collected to add to his herbarium. In 1857, Miles Joseph Berkeley was elected as member of the German Academy of Sciences Leopoldina. In June, 1879 he was elected a
Fellow of the Royal Society and was awarded their
Royal Medal in 1863. He died at his vicarage, Sibbertoft, near Market Harborough, on 30 July 1889. He is honoured in the naming of
Berkleasmium, which is a genus of fungi belonging to the family
Dematiaceae. He was also honoured in 1871, when English botanist and mycologist
Mordecai Cubitt Cooke examined a genus of pathogenic fungus and named them as
Sarcostroma, with the
type species named as
Sarcostroma berkeleyi . ==Family==