PLANT SCIENCE Bulletin Fall 2012 Volume 58 Number 3 2012 Merit Award Winners......page 38 Botanical Society of America’s PLANTs Grant Recipients and Mentors BSA Legacy Society Celebrates !...pg ?? In This Issue.............. Introducing APPS......p. 81 Congratulations to Naomi Volain....p. 95 A labor of love......................p. 98 From the Editor PLANT SCIENCE BULLETIN “Even those of the younger generation realize Editorial Committee that within their time the feeling of the people Volume 58 toward botany as a science and botany applied has changed greatly for the good of the work. I believe Root Gorelick this is due to the fact that the utilitarian side of (2012) botany has been kept largely in the foreground, and Department of Biology & the people have come to know and understand that School of Mathematics & a substantial encouragement of the work means a Statistics direct benefit to many important interests….I may Carleton University be preaching an heretical doctrine and be criticized Ottawa, Ontario on the ground that science has nothing to do with Canada, K1H 5N1 such material things and will take care of itself if [email protected] kept pure and undefiled. This may be true, but I have long since reached the opinion that the doctrine of science for science’s sake may be beautiful in theory, Elizabeth Schussler but faulty in practice. Some one [sic] has said that (2013) pure science and science applied are like abstract Department of Ecology & and practical Christianity, both beautiful, but one is Evolutionary Biology for gods and the other for men.” These words were University of Tennessee spoken in 1903 by Beverly T. Galloway, outgoing Knoxville, TN 37996-1610 President of the Botanical Society of America, in [email protected] his Presidential Address (Science 19:11-18). Galloway’s viewpoint was not shared by the Society as it basked in the glory days of the early 20th century. But now, nearly 110 years later, we Christopher Martine live in a society that has little understanding of our (2014) discipline and even less appreciation for its role in Department of Biology society. It is timely to reconsider our connection to Bucknell University applied plant science, especially in the agricultural Lewisburg, PA 17837 fields, and this is the challenge brought to us by [email protected] current President Elizabeth (Toby) Kellogg. We are happy to be able to share her Presidential Address from the annual meeting and hope that you will seriously consider her suggestion to make the connection between basic and applied plant science “more explicit more often.” Carolyn M. Wetzel (2015) Department of Biological Sci- -Marsh ences & Biochemistry Program Smith College Northampton, MA 01063 Tel. 413/585-3687 Lindsey K. Tuominen (2016) Warnell School of Forestry & Natural Resources The University of Georgia Athens, GA 30605 [email protected] Fall 2012 Volume 58 Number 3 Table of Contents Society News Erratum .............................................................................................................................78 Botany 2012 Presidential Address–Dr. Elizabeth A. Kellogg ..........................................78 New Journal Joins the BSA Family of Publications .........................................................81 A Behind-the-Secnes Look at the Botany Conference: Planning through Execution and Future Challenges .....................................................................................85 Awards from the Annual Meeting.....................................................................................91 BSA Science Education News and Notes PlantingScience ................................................................................................................94 Education Bits and Bobs ..................................................................................................95 Editors Choice Reviews ................................................................................ 97 Announcements Jacob Hoover Cowen Herbarium .....................................................................................98 Missouri Botanical Garden Receives $25,000 Grant For Development Of Advanced Plant Data Collection System ...........................................................................................99 American Philosophical Society Grants .........................................................................100 Harvard University Bullard Fellowships In Forest Research .........................................100 Reports and Reviews Botanical education in the United States: Part 2, The nineteenth century— Botany for the masses vs. the professionalization of botany .........................................101 Book Reviews ..............................................................................................132 Books Received ...........................................................................................143 Botany 2013 Celebrating Diversity! Hilton Riverside, New Orleans, LA July 26-31, 2013 www.botanyconference.org 77 Society News Erratum or agronomy, but rather have had a career in basic research. But I believe firmly in the continuum of In Volume 58, Issue 2 of the Plant Science Bulletin, basic to applied research. I’m not out there growing Codi Yeager should have been listed as a graduate crops, but I hope that the folks who are might read of West Virginia University, not Cornell University. and be informed by the work that I do. And I’d like We regret the error. to suggest that the work going on in BSA should be relevant as well. So let me repeat the question: Why don’t we Botany 2012 Presidential Address make more of a connection between the work Dr. Elizabeth A. Kellogg presented at this meeting or published in our journals and the area of food for the planet? At “Speaking of Food” this point I should clarify what I mean by the word “connect.” I’m speaking of those brief sentences (Note: The video and slides from this lecture can or paragraphs at the beginning or end of a talk or be found at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j1F article that place the work in its broadest possible m0oEbW54&feature=plcp.) context, the sentences that link the work to issues that the general public or at least the general Since this talk is right after a reception and right scientist might understand. These are sentences before dinner, it seemed like a good time to talk that might get picked up in press releases or might about food. This may seem like an odd topic for a find their way into the Broader Impacts section of President’s address; after all, most people choose to a grant proposal. stick with the theme chosen for the meeting. But I’ve been mulling over a question in my mind for As an example, while procrastinating on writing several months and decided to put it to you here this talk, I ran across an article that appeared in the today. The question is this: Why do we, in this BBC Science and Environment section earlier this particular scientific society [BSA], with its long week: “Antarctic moss lives on ancient penguin and distinguished tradition of research on plants, poo.” The article, written by science writer Victoria so rarely connect what we do to agriculture? I’m Gill, described the work of Prof. Sharon Robinson not planning on answering this question. Rather I “of the University of Wollongong in Australia, will explore it and conclude the talk with the same [who] has been studying Antarctica’s plants for 16 years.” Dr. Robinson is not a member of BSA—I Let me start with a bit of personal observation. checked. Her study had to do with nutrient capture My first course in any sort of plant biology was a and frost tolerance in Antarctic mosses, and could plant ecology course, which I took my senior year easily have been written by a member of the BSA. in college. I took it because it met after 9 AM, The “connector” was written by Ms. Gill: “Learning had an early exam, and didn’t have a lab. In other the molecular mechanisms behind plants’ abilities words, I was looking for an easy elective. After I to dry out but remain viable could help researchers graduated, I worked in a biochemistry lab for a to develop ways to store food or even medicines for while, realized that I didn’t really like killing rats long periods.” Just a very simple question taking and started thinking about what else I could do. this basic research and putting it in a broad and I thought back to that plant course and ended up agricultural context. working for the Forest Service for a while and then went back to grad school. There were many things So back to my question: Why is it rare to find from that first plant course that stuck with me, but such references to food or agriculture in the talks at one of them is the following quote from Gulliver’s this meeting and the articles in our journals? Travels by Jonathan Swift. “And he gave it for his This is particularly perplexing because opinion, that whoever could make two ears of everybody eats plants. Therefore, knowing more corn, or two blades of grass, to grow upon a spot of about plants is essential for everyone because they ground where only one grew before, would deserve have such an immediate impact on our lives, at better of mankind, and do more essential service to breakfast, lunch, dinner, snack time, and banquets his country, than the whole race of politicians put at conferences. When we introduce students or together.” Obviously I did not go into plant breeding the general public to plants, we immediately