It takes two: A synopsis of a symposium about symbiosis [Video]

From Plant Press, Vol. 24, No. 3, July 2021.

By Gary A. Krupnick

The 18^th Smithsonian Botanical Symposium, co-hosted by the Smithsonian’s Department of Botany and the United States Botanic Garden, was held virtually over two days on May 13 and 14, 2021. The Symposium, “Plant symbiosis: The good, the bad, and the complicated,” was originally scheduled to take place in May 2020 at the National Museum of Natural History (NMNH) in Washington, DC, but the coronavirus global pandemic pushed the symposium to 2021. The digital event this year successfully brought together six engaging speakers in a Zoom webinar setting to explore current research in the diversity of plant symbioses, examining the relationships plants have with insects, fungi, bacteria, and even other plants. Invited speakers included botanists, ecologists, microbiologists, and geneticists whose research unravels the complicated relationships that plants have with their collaborators and competitors in the natural world.

Rebecca Johnson delivers opening remarks and spoke about the museum’s strong relationship with the U.S. Botanic Garden and our shared mission to educate the public about plants.

Eric Schuettpelz, Chair of Botany at NMNH, welcomed the virtual audience to the symposium and Rebecca Johnson, Associate Director for Science and Chief Scientist at NMNH, provided opening remarks. Johnson spoke about our strong relationship with the U.S. Botanic Garden and talked about our shared mission to educate the public about plants and their importance to people and the environment. She celebrated the amazing progress that the Botany Department has made in fully digitizing the specimens in the U.S. National Herbarium and the benefits of those digitized specimens to the scientific community. Even though the museum’s doors have been closed, the research still goes on.

Kenneth Wurdack, NMNH Department of Botany, presented the annual José Cuatrecasas Medal for Excellence in Tropical Botany to Sebsebe Demissew from Gullele Botanic Garden and Addis Ababa University, Ethiopia. Demissew accepted the Cuatrecasas Medal from Africa. He expressed his gratitude and encouraged those viewing the symposium to initiate collaboration with Ethiopian botanists.

Sebsebe Demissew accepts the 18th José Cuatrecasas Medal for Excellence in Tropical Botany remotely from Ethiopia, Africa.