Jean Baptiste Christophore Fusée Aublet

Jean Baptiste Christophore Fusée Aublet (November 4, 1720 – May 6, 1778) was a French pharmacist, botanist and one of the earliest botanical explorers in South America. He was one of the first botanists to study ethnobotany in the Neotropics.

Born in Salon-de-Provence, Aublet left home early and traveled to Grenada, then a French colony, where he became an apothecary's assistant and learned about medicinal plants. A year later he returned to France and continued his studies in natural history, chemistry, and pharmacology. One of his mentors was Bernard de Jussieu, a French naturalist who would later help him with plant identification.

He joined the French East India Company and in 1752 was sent to Mauritius (then known as l'Île de France) to establish a pharmacy and a botanical garden. He became involved in an intense rivalry with Pierre Poivre, a fellow botanist at the Mon Plaisir garden, and eventually left to establish a new garden at Le Réduit.

When Aublet returned to France in 1762, he was appointed to a position as the King's apothecary and botanist in French Guiana. He arrived at the colonial capital, Isle de Cayenne, in August 1762 and spent the next two years collecting plants and assembling a vast herbarium. Aublet also worked with the local people to record the traditional uses of the native plants, and often used their names for the plants as the basis for the scientific names he bestowed upon taxa.