The Plant Press

Smithsonian Sun Shines at National Scientific Meetings as Interns Present Their Research

From Plant Press, Vol. 14, No. 2 from April 2011.

By Karen Redden, Bertrand Ndzelen and Tseday Tegegn

Over the past year, the Department of Botany has been hosting a number of undergraduates from the University of the District of Columbia (UDC). The University is a member of the Historically Black Universities and College (HBCU) and is an urban land-grant, public institution. The students are culturally, economically and ethnically diverse. The UDC interns were supported through the Smithsonian Science, Technology and Engineering Program (STEP) and the UDC Science, Technology, Engineering and Math (STEM) program.

Students from the University of the District of Columbia with their mentors (from left: Sewalem Mebrate, Bertrand Ndzelen, Vicki Funk, Tseday Tegegn, Emily Frew, and Karen Redden).

These interns have been involved in a variety of projects including creating Encyclopedia of Life (EoL) pages for members of the Compositae, exploring molecular and morphological phylogenetic relationships within Compositae and Caesalpinioideae and data basing collections from the Guiana Shield. The culmination of their research produced a number of poster and oral presentations given at four different venues, disseminating the information to the broader scientific community.

Four interns presented posters at the Flora of the Guiana’s annual meeting held in Washington, D.C., in November 2010. Under the direction of Vicki Funk and Karen Redden, Hayley Hamilton and Tseday Tegegn presented their research on members of the Compositae and Sewalem Mebrate and Bertrand Ndzelen presented their preliminary phylogenies on two genera of the Caesalpinoid legumes: Dicymbe and Eperua. For all of these interns, this was their first experience in presenting scientific data and their presentations were well received. All abstracts were published in the Flora of the Guianas newsletter.

Ndzelen and Tegegn presented their research at both the Emerging Researchers National Conference in Stem held in Washington, D.C., and the joint annual National Institute of Science/Beta Kappa Chi meeting in Atlanta, Georgia. The theme of the latter meeting was the effects of environmental pollutants on the biosphere. The oral presentations “Preliminary Diversity and Systematics of the Genus Eperua” and “Phylogeny and Biodiversity of Wulffia (Compositae: Heliantheae s.s.)” addressed the importance of taxonomic science in conservation and preservation of biodiversity and were unique in these typically biomedical-dominated conferences. One judge commented that “it is refreshing to see molecular phylogenies in the undergraduate sessions when the topic was previously only explored by the graduate competitors.”

On 12 April, at the UDC’s Undergraduate Research Day, Ndzelen and Tegegn presented their research to the faculty and STEM student body. Both gave excellent oral presentations and again were unique in a medically dominated competition. This time their perseverance paid off and Ndzelen was awarded first place in Biology.

Emily Frew, a volunteer intern since September 2010, will be presenting her research on the evolution of Pacific Bidens at the Evolution of Life on Pacific Islands and Reefs meeting, 26-29 May 2011, at the University of Hawaii <botany.si.edu/events/2011_pacific/>.

This is just the beginning. The 2011 summer promises to expand the UDC internship opportunities, including both new and continuing opportunities. Both Ndzelen and Tegegn want to continue with their research. The Department is looking forward to all these bright young people bringing a “breath of fresh floral air” back to Natural History this year. 

New to Nature

From Plant Press Vol. 14, no. 2

An exceptionally attractive Malagasy flowering plant, Dombeya gautieri (Dombeyaceae), described by Department of Botany Curator Larry Dorr and Cindy Skema (Massey University, New Zealand) and named in honor of its collector, Laurent Gautier (Conservatoire et Jardin botaniques, Geneva), was featured in a weekly column published in The Guardian by Quentin Wheeler (International Institute for Species Exploration, Arizona State University). While the Royal Wedding is certain to attract more attention than this new species, the newspaper article will receive more than its share of attention as The Guardian has a print circulation of 280,000 and its on-line readership is second only to that of The New York Times. An image of the holotype is available in the U.S. National Herbarium Type Register.

Holotype of Dombeya gautieri (Dombeyaceae)

Spring Flowering on Facebook

From Plant Press, Vol. 14, No. 2 from April 2011.

The first-flowering dates for spring-blooming plants for the Washington-Baltimore area have been recorded by more than 100 volunteers in the Department of Botany, NMNH, each year from January 1 to May 31 since 1970. The DC Flora Spring Flowering webpage <botany.si.edu/dcflora/springflowers/> gives information about range of dates that the spring flowers have been observed to start blooming within the Washington area over the years 1970-2011, where you can find them, and 100 of the most commonly observed flowers.

The Spring Flowering project has joined the social network with its own Facebook page, “Spring Flowers of The Washington-Baltimore Area” <www.facebook.com/dc.spring.flowers>. This colorful page has weekly updates of spring flowering plants and images taken from our DC Flora image repository. In addition, members can add their own flower sightings. You must be a Facebook member to access this page.

Making Sense of the Schomburgk Expeditions

From Plant Press, Vol. 14, No. 2 from April 2011.

By Sara Alexander

Robert Hermann Schomburgk (1804-1865) was possibly the most important of the early botanical collectors in Guyana, and was the first scientist to explore many of its interior regions. He and his younger brother Moritz Richard Schomburgk (1811-1891) explored Guyana and adjacent Brazil and Venezuela between 1835 and 1844, during which time they discovered many new species and collected many types. The U.S. National Herbarium holds 334 of these type specimens, and information and images for many are available through the Botany Department’s online Type Specimen Register <botany.si.edu/types>.

The Biological Diversity of the Guiana Shield Program (BDG) recently completed a project to georeference all US-held botanical types specimens from the Guiana Shield; 3,400 specimens (Garcia-Milagros and Funk, 2010. Frontiers of Biogeography 2(3): 71-77), and produce maps in Google Earth <botany.si.edu/bdg/georeferencing.cfm>. This was not possible for all types: 97 percent of types from the Venezuelan state of Amazonas could be georeferenced, but only 61 percent of types from Guyana. One of the largest sources of these ungeoreferenced type specimens was the type collections made by the Schomburgk brothers. The purpose of this article is to explore and explain the cause of this ambiguity.

Robert Hermann Schomburgk (1804-1865)

Soon after the formation of the colony of British Guiana in 1814, Robert Schomburgk was employed by the Royal Geographical Society of London to survey its interior. Between 1835 and 1839 he made three journeys to inland Guyana and on through Venezuela, tracing the Essequibo River to its source and surveying areas neglected during Alexander von Humboldt’s earlier explorations of the upper Orinoco River. Richard Schomburgk accompanied him on four additional expeditions and several shorter excursions between 1841 and 1844. In their quest to survey the boundaries of British Guiana, the brothers traveled thousands of miles through the interior, taking notes, collecting biological specimens, and observing the cultures of local Amerindians (van Dam, 2002).

Expeditions made by the Schomburgk brothers can be outlined as follows:

Robert’s solo expeditions:

1. Up the Essequibo from Georgetown to the Rupununi River, and from there to Annai and the Amerindian village of Pirara (21 September 1835 – 28 March 1836).

2. Along the Courantyne and Berbice Rivers (2 September 1836 – March 1837).

3. Up the Essequibo River to its source, and Mount Roraima (12 September 1837 – 9 November 1838).

4. Esmeralda and Fort Sao Joaquim in Brazil, along the Orinoco River and its tributaries, and along the Rio Casiquiare in Venezuela (21 November 1838 – 20 June 1839).

Stahl Exhibition Opens in Puerto Rico

From Plant Press, Vol. 14, No. 2 from April 2011.

Stigmaphyllon emarginatum by Agustin Stahl

Pedro Acevedo recently curated an exhibition, “Dr. Agustin Stahl: Botanical Watercolors,” at the art gallery of the Universidad del Sagrado Corazón, Puerto Rico, featuring 90 reproductions of botanical watercolors made by Agustin Stahl (1842-1917), a Puerto Rican physician and naturalist who published the first flora of Puerto Rico from 1883-88. The original watercolors, in the collections of the University of Puerto Rico in Mayagüez and the Instituto de Cultura Puertorriqueña, were scanned in Puerto Rico and have been available through Botany’s website <botany.si.edu/Antilles/PRFlora/Stahl/index.cfm> since 2005.

In 2010, Acevedo obtained a grant from Smithsonian Latino Center to produce an exhibit highlighting Stahl’s botanical artwork. The project, which involved the digital restoration of 90 images by Fiona Wilkinson at NMNH took more than six months to complete. In early 2011, Acevedo, Wilkinson, and Vinita Gowda traveled to Puerto Rico to set-up the exhibit. The opening took place on 10 February, with a presentation by Acevedo featuring Stahl’s scientific accomplishments and the process of digital restoration of Stahl’s watercolors. The opening was well attended with more than 200 people from all over the island. The exhibition was on view through 3 March, with several hundred people visiting the exhibit. New venues are being identified to ensure that the exhibition reaches diverse audiences.

Art by Alice Tangerini: Zephyranthes proctorii Acev.-Rodr. & M.T. Strong

From Plant Press, Vol. 14, No. 2 from April 2011.

Pedro Acevedo recently curated an exhibition in Puerto Rico featuring 90 reproductions of botanical watercolors made by Agustin Stahl (1842-1917) (see page 4). Alice Tangerini has made several illustrations of her own of the Puerto Rican flora, including the endemic Zephyranthes proctorii (Amaryllidaceae), featured in Acevedo-Rodríguez and Strong’s treatment of the Monocotyledons and Gymnosperms of Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands (Contr. U.S. Natl. Herb. 52: 1-415; 2005). Zephyranthes proctorii is found in dry forest scrub and thickets on limestone. The species is morphologically similar to the widespread Z. rosea from which it differs by the much shorter pedicels.

Awards & Grants

From Plant Press, Vol. 14, No. 2 from April 2011.

Carlos García-Robledo received a National Geographic / Waitt Institute grant (early career grant) to support his postdoctoral fellowship project “Using DNA barcodes to model tropical plant extinctions and co-extinction cascades of associated insect herbivores under projected climate change.”

XVIII International Botanical Congress

From Plant Press, Vol. 14, No. 2 from April 2011.

By Laurence Dorr and Vicki Funk

Since 1969, the International Botanical Congress (IBC) has been held every six years. While there are 19^th century antecedents, the modern incarnation of this important scientific meeting began in 1900 in Paris and at four to six year intervals subsequent meetings were held mostly in European and North American cities. This summer, or winter depending upon your perspective, the XVIII International Botanical Congress will be held in Melbourne, Australia. The Congress proper, which will occur from 23-30 July 2011 is preceded by the Nomenclature Section, which will convene from 18-22 July 2011. Both are important events and both are of paramount importance to systematic botany.

Our Department plans to have a strong presence at the XVIII International Botanical Congress and this will reflect well on the National Museum of Natural History (NMNH) and the Smithsonian Institution. Participation in the IBC will give us an opportunity to present our ideas on an international stage, and it will give us countless opportunities to acquire new knowledge about research and techniques, give us insight into potential new trends and opportunities that can benefit our research, help us identify strong candidates for graduate and postdoctoral fellowships and other collaborations, and even suggest new funding possibilities. The IBC also will give us a platform to advance NMNH and Smithsonian Institution scientific initiatives, most notably the Encyclopedia of Life, the Biodiversity Heritage Library, and the Global Genome Initiative.

Nine curators (Pedro Acevedo, Laurence Dorr, Robert Faden, Vicki Funk, W. John Kress, Paul Peterson, Warren Wagner, Jun Wen, and Kenneth Wurdack) and two resident research associates (Christian Feuillet and Robert Soreng) in the Department of Botany, NMNH, as well as the librarian (Robin Everly) of the Botany and Horticulture Library, Smithsonian Institution Libraries, plan to attend the XVIII International Botanical Congress and will present a wide range of talks and posters. The Congress anticipates holding up to 150 general symposia, allowing up to 900 oral presentations. In addition, provision has been made for sessions to display the results of research as posters, including ePosters that will be displayed on computer monitors instead of paper. The symposia are organized into seven major themes; Systematics, evolution, biogeography & biodiversity informatics; Ecology, environmental change & conservation; Structure, development & cellular biology; Genetics, genomics & bioinformatics; Physiology & biochemistry; Economic botany including biotechnology, agriculture & plant breeding; and Plants in society. Most of us who attend will be speaking in symposia falling under the umbrella of either the Systematics or Genetics themes. In addition, W. John Kress will give one of several key note addresses in a session devoted to Plant Taxonomy in the 21st Century. The title of his talk is “Plant DNA barcoding: the future of taxonomy, ecology, and species discovery.”

Seven of us (Acevedo, Dorr, Feuillet, Funk, Peterson, Soreng, and Wagner) plan to participate in the Nomenclature Section that precedes the Congress proper. This is the sole venue where the rules and recommendations of the International Code of Botanical Nomenclature can be revised or modified and it absolutely requires our participation. A number of far-reaching and controversial proposals are scheduled to be debated next year, including mechanisms for implementing valid electronic publication of botanical names, an idea first put forward by a member of our department at the XV IBC in Tokyo. We have always played a major role in deciding the fate of the rules and this is reflected in the fact that we are one of only eight institutions worldwide that is given the maximum number (seven) of institutional votes allowed. The assignment of institutional votes is based on “taxonomic activity” and participation in the Nomenclature Section is one important indicator of such activity. Also, individual scientists from the Smithsonian who attend the Section are given a single vote, and they can carry proxies for institutions unable to send representatives to the IBC. Thus when one combines our institutional votes, individual votes, and proxies we have a loud voice that can steer the discussions and debates toward resolutions that benefit us (and the botanical community).

A strong presence in the Nomenclature Section is also important for our ongoing collaborations with colleagues in Latin America and Africa as neither region will be sending a large number of delegates to the Congress. While there are no figures yet concerning the number of delegates who plan to attend the Nomenclature Section, preliminary figures (www.ibc2011.com) for the Congress as a whole show, as one would expect, that the greatest number of attendees will be coming from Australia and New Zealand (ca. 400 delegates), followed by Asia (ca. 370), North America (ca. 300), Europe (ca. 270), Latin America (ca. 120), and Africa (ca. 40).

Before, during or after the XVIII International Botanical Congress there will be opportunity to study collections in the National Herbarium of Victoria (MEL), which is situated in the Royal Botanic Gardens, Melbourne, as well as other herbaria in Australia. Admittedly winter is not the best season for finding flowering plants, but a number of us also will stay on after the Congress to participate in field work. Future issues of the Plant Press undoubtedly will feature accounts of some of these excursions to various parts of this large, island continent.

We are grateful to Cristián Samper, Director of the National Museum of Natural History, and an anonymous donor for financial support that allows us to have a strong presence at this Congress. We are fully aware that the ability of the Department of Botany, including the U.S. National Herbarium, to continue to maintain its stature as one of the pre-eminent botanical research institutions in the world is conditioned not only on excellent staff, rich collections, and facilities, but also our full engagement with the international scientific community. 

A New Look Inside Palms

From Plant Press, Vol. 14, No. 2 from April 2011.

By P. Barry Tomlinson, James W. Horn, and Jack B. Fisher

Palms (family Arecaceae) are recognized as icons of the tropics, in addition to being the source of many economically significant products that globally extend relevance of the group to millions of people daily. This family of about 183 genera and over 2,400 species exhibits striking morphological and ecological variability, despite most members being readily identifiable as palms because of their distinctive habit as monocot trees of stately elegance. The charismatic external form of palms has inspired almost two centuries of research devoted to the family, which has advanced a knowledge of palm biology and systematics beyond that of most other tropical plant families.

Hidden from view, but no less compelling, is the internal structure of palms—an understanding of which is essential for interpreting many of the unique biological aspects of the family. Furthermore, anatomy provides a wealth of comparative information important for discerning relationships among palm genera. Aesthetically, sections of palm tissues, when stained and viewed with a microscope, can rival in beauty even the most horticulturally desirable palms. In the new book, The Anatomy of Palms (Oxford University Press; 2011), P. Barry Tomlinson, James W. Horn, and Jack B. Fisher provide the definitive, up-to-date reference work on this topic, which showcases both the science and art inside palms.

Maps Catalog

From Plant Press Vol 14 no. 2

The Smithsonian Institution, since the earliest days, has sent its researchers on expeditions to fulfill the mission of increasing and diffusing knowledge. These researchers usually relied on maps to plan and guide their quests. Efforts have been made recently to organize the maps that have accumulated over the years. The Maps Catalog website is a result of those efforts. Until recently, this information has only been available within the Smithsonian, but may now be viewed by the general public.

Detail of Botany Map 7556 (1 of 17 sheets): Manuscript maps of Northwestern China and adjacent Tibet from 1945. These handmade maps by botanist Joseph F. Rock detail his Ch'ing-Hai Upper Yellow River Expedition through western China and the Tibetan area during 1925-27. Various geographic features, Chinese and Tibetan towns and communities, are shown in both Chinese and Tibetan. A hand written note from Rock is on the reverse side of the first sheet.

The Maps Catalog currently includes about 14,000 distinct maps covering about 11,000 subjects, with nearly 7000 high resolution images available for viewing. Viewers can search for details about any of the maps, spread across five different collections (Botany, Amphibians & Reptiles, Mammals, African Art and the Smithsonian Environmental Research Center), using four different methods (subject search, geographic search, coordinate search, and advanced search).

The website is the product of the efforts of volunteer Jim Harle (Botany), who was recruited by Rusty Russell in 1994 to curate its maps, organizing them into a collection. Each map has as many as 30 different pieces of information about it entered into the database. Maps that are fragile are put in polyethylene bags. Each map is scanned and the image is cleaned up with Photoshop. Together with over 30 interns, he has cataloged over 9000 of Botany’s approximately 10,000 maps and has expanded to other collections with Entomology coming soon.

Harle has had several fascinating discoveries while digging through various assortments of maps. One discovery had nothing directly to do with maps. While going through maps stored in Botany’s area of the museum’s basement, he came across a manila envelope labeled “Japanese Balloon Fragment.” Inside was documentation and correspondences related to a Japanese effort during World War II to build balloons to carry bombs across the Pacific to land in the United States. Alas, there was no balloon fragment. A few months later, he was digging through a different case in the basement and located the actual balloon fragment. Two years later, Harle tracked down a curator in the National Air and Space Museum who had another balloon fragment that was not in as good shape and lacked any documentation. The curator was quite pleased with Harle’s discovery.