Bryological Times 1994 79
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Volume 79 June 1994 ISSN 0253-4738 Contents Product News: Herbarium aids ............................. 2 Product news: useful watches ............................... 2 New literature ....................................................... 3 Program of the ABLS annual meeting in Knoxville, Tenessee, 7-11 August 1994 ............................ 3 New publications .................................................. 5 News from the Herbaria:The Richard Spruce collections in MANCH ..................................... 6 A simple method for clearing up slides of mosses for observation with the light microscope. ........ 7 Invitation to a plenary meeting of the European Committee for the Conservation of Bryophytes ECCB .............................................................. 7 Collecting ............................................................. 8 European bryologist: Would your research benefit from a visit to Helsinki? ................................... 9 DIARY ............................................................... 11 Cont’d. ............................................................... 11 DIARY ............................................................... 12 A Bryologist of Eminence Retires S. C. Bhatla, Department of Botany, Delhi University, Delhi-110007, India. In his research career now spanning ing their taxonomy and morphology. writing, portrait sketching, vocal music more than 40 years, Professor R. N. Professor Chopra has to his credit and photography. In 1991 he published Chopra, FBS (born October 12, 1929) has more than 165 papers including contri- a book - ‘Life and Nature’ comprising made significant contributions in Plant butions to books and comprehensive re- 60 poems in English. Embryology, Morphogenesis and Bryo- views. His book ‘Biology of Bryophytes’ Having devoted more then four dec- logy. In embryology, he discovered the (written together with P. K. Kumra) was ades in his research career, Professor now well known endosperm haustoria in published by Wiley Eastern Ltd., New Chopra superannuates on October 12, the Cucurbitaceae and also unraveled the Delhi, in 1988. this book has become a 1994. unique embryological features of the very useful reference for post-graduate families Podostemaceae, Moraceae, students and research scholars alike. His Cactaceae, Anacardiaceae, Bixaceae and second book ‘Bryophyte Development: Cornaceae. In morphogenesis, Professor Physiology and Biochemistry’ (edited Chopra served as a member of the pio- together with S. C. Bhatla) was published neering group of the late Professor in 1990 by CRC Press, Inc., Boca Raton. Maheshwari in early 1950s in initiating One more book on bryophytes - ‘Topics researches on cell and tissue culture of in Bryology’ is under preparation. plants which include culture of overies Professor Chopra has served as an and ovules. But his more abiding inter- Additional Secretary of the International ests during the last 32 years have been in Society of Plant Morphologists (1975- the area of morphogenesis and physiol- 84); Head, Department of Botany and ogy of bryophytes. Professor Chopra has Director, Centre of Advanced Study in made interesting, original contributions Botany, University of Delhi (1982-82); in understanding bud development in Councillor of the Indian Botanical Soci- mosses, reproductive growth, apogamy ety (1987-89); Vice-President of the In- and apospory. Nonetheless, his interests dian Bryological Society (1983-85) and have been wider and have embraced the has been its President since 1985. Pro- biology of bryophytes as a whole includ- fessor Chopra’s hobbies include poetry 2 The Bryological Times No. 79, 1994 Product News Herbarium aids file on disk and to give a name to it - mal scanner with 256 grey scales and a Everybody working in a herbarium you cannot just drag the scanner over normal scan width of 105mm, However, during a visit is faced with the prob- the label and then go to the next. So if the option “scan text” is chosen, it im- lem: there are thousands of specimens this method is not a great advantage ports directly into many word processors each with a herbarium label including compared with xeroxing. Text recog- for MS-Windows, e.g. into Word for Win- information which is needed for cita- nition programs may allow the pic- dows, WordPerfect for Windows or Lo- tion of the specimen. For a monograph ture to be translated into an ASCII tus Ami Pro. Price approx. 600.- DM or revision, all this information must file (if it is type- and not handwrit- (US$ 350). be taken home. There are usually sev- ten). Although the recognition rate is eral possibilities, for instance one can quite high in modern programs and UsefulWatches does not depend on a special type font, write down the label text and retype it In the Bryological Times no. 62/63 it still requires the picture to be sent into the computer at home; or it may (October 1991), a wrist watch with built through the text recognition program, be possible to xerox the specimens with in altimeter was announced and recom- adding one more step to the proce- labels or the whole herbarium sheets. I mended for fieldwork because of its small dure and making it slower. So it was personally used to write the data on file size and weight, high accuracy and low still a vision to sit in a herbarium and cards in different colours (e.g. for types price compared with a standard altimeter. drag over one label after the other and exsiccate series). It would, of This altimeter wrist watch model made with a scanner connected to a small course, make sense to have the data in by CASIO is no longer available but has notebook and to get the label infor- the computer, allowing you to incorpo- been replaced by a less attractive analogue mation into the computer as text. But rate them later into a manuscript, pre- watch with built in altimeter for the same this vision is now reality. venting the need for retyping. Maybe price. CASIO which is famous for Primax now offers a pen-like in some herbaria there are now com- multifunction watches (e.g. for measur- handy scanner called Lector DataPen, puters, perhaps the older makes which ing blood preasure, diving watches or which does not need a adapter card are no longer used in the offices, in biorythm watches) has again changed its but is connected to the parallel port. which the data can be entered and taken offer and has developed three other al- It is dragged over the text and can home on disk. Notebook computers are timeter watches: read only one line at a time but has ideal for this purpose. Although the AW-330 AT-9E is again an analogue simultaneous text recognition (of notebooks today have a 486 or at least watch with digital altimeter. It works up characters from eleven different lan- a 386 processor and are priced higher to 4000 m and 100 m below sea level. It guages) and can read and recognize than desktop machines, there are still shows the absolute altitude, the difference 1800 characters per minute. It uses 286-notebooks available at real bargain in altitude to a previous point and the ten- the TWAIN interface of Windows pro- prices which fulfill the expected re- dency of air pressure. The price is DM grams and thus can read text directly quirement of replacing a note-book and 189 in Germany (approx. US 115). into a word processor or also num- allowing you to keep notes e.g. on a trip ALT-6000J is a digital model. It works bers into a spreadsheet. It is also use- away from home. up to 6000 m, has a memory for 50 read- ful for preparing manuscripts. If But there are always easier meth- ings from which a profile is shown as a someone wants to include part of a ods. When handy scanners became bar. It includes a barometer which shows diagnosis, locality information or a available six or seven years ago, I the air pressure, the tendency of air pres- reference into their own manuscript, thought about scanning the label text sure and minimum and maximum val- they can easily scan this text directly into a computer. What sounds so easy ues. It is also waterproof to 100 m depth into the wordprocessor. The price is in fact more complicated. Firstly the and includes in addition a thermometer complete with software is at present scanner requires an adapter card to con- ranging from -20° to +60° and should be ca. $400.— but will probably go down nect with the computer and this ex- ideal for fieldtrips. The price is DM 299 in the future. cludes the use with a laptop or a note- in Germany (US$ 175). Another scanner which can rec- book for a botanist visiting a herbarium. BM-200WJ resembles the altitmeter ognise characters instantaneously and There are only a very few handy scan- announced in the Bryological Times in read text from labels or bibliographies ner models which can be adapted to the 1991 with a range up to 4000 m, indica- into a manuscript is ScanMan Easy parallel port of the computer and thus tion of air pressure and tendency of air Touch, by Logitech. It is also con- used in combination with a notebook. pressure over the past 18 hours displayed nected to the parallel port and thus Secondly, it scans only an image and as a bar graph. As with the previous mod- usable with notebooks. In contrast only the picture file can be taken home els, it has several alarms and is water- with the DataPen, it resembles a nor- on disk. It also requires you to save the proof down to 100 m. It costs DM 179. No. 79, 1994 The Bryological Times 3 A simple method for clearing up slides of mosses for observation with Bryophyte the light microscope. curation in Berlin: J.D. Kruijer & N. Klazenga, Rijksherbarium/Hortus Botanicus, P.O. Box a disclaimer 9514, 2300 RA Leiden, The Netherlands. In a recently published note, Frahm Slides of moss material for obser- for the purpose of clearing up and in- (in Bryol. Times 77: 7. 1994) makes the vation with the light microscope are not creasing the contrast of moss material following assertion: ”The material of always sufficiently transparent.