From Plant Press, Vol. 24, No. 3, July 2021.
The José Cuatrecasas Medal for Excellence in Tropical Botany is named in honor of Dr. José Cuatrecasas, a pioneering botanist and taxonomist, who spent nearly a half-century working at the National Museum of Natural History. Cuatrecasas had a distinguished career devoted to systematic botany and plant exploration in tropical South America, especially in the Andes, and this award serves to keep vibrant his accomplishments and memory. The Department of Botany and the U.S. National Herbarium present this award at the Smithsonian Botanical Symposium to a botanist and scholar of international stature who has contributed significantly to advancing the field of tropical botany. The award consists of a bronze medal bearing an image of José Cuatrecasas on the front with the recipient’s name and date of presentation on the back.
This year the 18th José Cuatrecasas Medal for Excellence in Tropical Botany was presented to Sebsebe Demissew.
Professor Demissew earned a B.Sc. in 1977 and a M.S. in 1980 from Addis Ababa University, and his Ph.D. in 1985 from Uppsala University for research on Maytenus, a genus of Celastraceae in tropical Africa and Arabia. His doctoral training was sponsored during the early stages of the Ethiopian Flora Project and he later (from 1996 to its successful completion in 2009) provided leadership of the project involving 91 scientists from 17 countries. This 8-volume work covering 6000 species of ferns and flowering plants with 12 percent endemism, is one of the few finished African floras.
Demissew has authored or coauthored 250 scientific publications and is the authority for 94 new plant names in 13 families. His career at Addis Ababa University has continued as a faculty member and Dean, and he is presently a Professor of Plant Systematics and Biodiversity, and Executive Director of the Gullele Botanic Garden, which is a joint venture of the university and the city of Addis Ababa. The botanic garden is the first of its kind for Ethiopia and was opened to the public in 2019. It has an education and conservation mission. He has had a leadership role in international organizations, and notably as Secretary General from 2000-2003 of AETFAT (Association for the Taxonomic Study of the Flora Tropical Africa). In 2016 he was awarded the Kew International Medal for internationally recognized work aligned with the science and conservation mission of the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew.
The Cuatrecasas Medal selection committee took special note of Professor Demissew’s many accomplishments as a scientist, tropical botanist, and educator. The committee noted his lifelong work to document and conserve Ethiopian biodiversity with its rich endemism, including leadership of the Ethiopian Flora Project and the National Herbarium. He has been a role model for internationally recognized excellence in the botany of tropical Africa.
Ken Wurdack presented the medal virtually to Demissew via the video conferencing platform Zoom at the 18th Smithsonian Botanical Symposium. Speaking from Ethiopia, Demissew was grateful and humbled to be the recipient of such a prestigious award. Demissew spoke about his research both within Ethiopia and outside of the country, including Somalia, Kenya, Uganda, Tanzania, Cameroon, and South Africa. During his thank you speech, he encouraged the audience to consider initiating collaborations in geography, botany, and geology with Addis Ababa University. He described the vegetative diversity of Ethiopia and explained the wide geographic altitude, with areas as low as 125 meters above sea level to as high as 4530 meters on the mountains.
The past recipients of the Cuatrecasas Medal are Rogers McVaugh from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill (2001); P. Barry Tomlinson from Harvard University (2002); John Beaman from the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew (2003); David Mabberley from the University of Leiden, The Netherlands, and the Royal Botanic Gardens, Sydney (2004); Jerzy Rzedowski and Graciela Calderón de Rzedowski from Instituto de Ecología del Bajío, Michoacán, Mexico (2005); Sherwin Carlquist from Rancho Santa Ana Botanic Garden and Pomona College (2006); Mireya D. Correa A. from the University of Panama and Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute (2008); Norris H. Williams from the Florida Museum of Natural History and the University of Florida, Gainesville (2009); Beryl B. Simpson from the University of Texas at Austin (2010); Walter S. Judd from the University of Florida at Gainesville (2012); Ana Maria Giulietti Harley from the Universidade Estadual de Feira de Santana, Brazil (2013); H. Peter Linder from Zurich University (2014); Paulo Günter Windisch from Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Sul, Brazil (2015); Kamal Bawa from the University of Massachusetts Boston (2016); Robin B. Foster from the Field Museum (2017); Alan K. Graham from the Missouri Botanical Garden (2018); and Sandra Knapp from the Natural History Museum in London (2019).
The presentation of the medal and the acceptance by Demissew was recorded and is available at NMNH’s Natural History For Scientists YouTube page:
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