From aceska at telus.net Fri Aug 21 16:08:10 2009 From: aceska at telus.net (Adolf & Oluna Ceska) Date: Fri, 21 Aug 2009 08:08:10 -0700 Subject: [BEN-L]BEN # 412 Message-ID: <000101ca2271$32cc2950$98647bf0$@net> BBBBB EEEEEE NN N ISSN 1188-603X BB B EE NNN N BBBBB EEEEE NN N N BOTANICAL BB B EE NN NN ELECTRONIC BBBBB EEEEEE NN N NEWS No. 412 August 21, 2009 aceska@telus.net Victoria, B.C. ----------------------------------------------------------- Dr. A. Ceska, P.O.Box 8546, Victoria, B.C. Canada V8W 3S2 ----------------------------------------------------------- E-FLORA BC: A WORK IN PROGRESS From: Brian Klinkenberg (Department of Geography, UBC, brian@geog.ubc.ca). E-Flora BC (www.eflora.bc.ca) is an online biogeographical atlas of the plants of British Columbia that provides distribution mapping and summary ecological information. E-Flora BC has grown substantially since it first became available in 2004 with the launching of 3480 atlas pages for vascular plants (which brought the 8 volumes of the Illustrated Flora of British Columbia online). Today, E-Flora covers vascular plants, non-vascular plants, fungi and lichens, and includes a growing photo gallery. But there is more yet to be done. Although we have more than 5,500 atlas pages already available on E-Flora, there are still gaps in species coverage. Atlas pages are now available for 300 lichen and 1680 fungi species, thanks to Trevor Goward, Del Meidenger and Ian Gibson, but only a comparatively few atlas pages are available for bryophytes (407) and algae (142). The atlas pages in these groups have brought online two publications: Some Mosses of British Columbia (by Wilf Schofield) and North Pacific Seaweeds (by Rita O'Clair and Sandra Lindstrom). Each of these covers just over 100 species, only a small portion of the BC flora for these groups. However, we hope to provide additional coverage of these, and first up will be the addition of twenty atlas pages on liverworts, prepared by the late Wilf Schofield. E-Flora is a large and complex project and, in addition to developing more atlas pages, we are busy adding new features to the site, updating mapping and generally adding more capability. Recent additions and changes include: . We have just updated the static distribution maps that appear on the E-Flora atlas pages. The new maps incorporate the database updates contributed by our data providers, and include new distribution dots. In addition, our data providers are constantly editing and polishing their databases and removing typographical errors and questionable outliers in distribution. (None-the-less, unfortunately, errors can still be found in many databases.) . An exciting new feature on E-Flora is the addition of the capability to add 'additional notes' and keys to the atlas pages. Keys for many genera are now being added, and ecological and taxonomic notes will be added on an ongoing basis. . In 2009, the vascular plant Ecological Frameworks that appear on the atlas pages for many species were updated. These frameworks were developed from plot data provided by the BC Ministry of Forests and Range. The species parameters presented in the frameworks were recalculated in 2009 based on additional plot information and an updated database. These ecological summaries provide interesting insights into individual species ecology. . There is now a substantial macrofungi component on E-Flora, thanks to Ian Gibson. Incorporation of 1680 macrofungi species accounts provided by Ian from his MatchMaker program (http://forestry-dev.org/biodiversity/matchmaker/index_e.html ) has allowed us to bring in a substantial number of fungi atlas pages. . Michael Hawkes is presently working on an update to the algae species list, both species additions and nomenclatural changes. These changes will be incorporated into E-Flora when available. . Invasive species information on E-Flora has been expanded. We have now incorporated the E-Flora list of invasive and noxious weeds into our atlas pages. This list covers more species than the previous MOF&R list and is based on species listed as problem species by BC agencies and invasive plant groups. We have also added direct links to the BC Ministry of Forests and Range 'Report-a-Weed' feature in order to encourage the reporting of new locations for invasive species in BC. The Report-a-Weed button now appears on individual atlas pages for those species the Invasive Alien Plant Program are tracking. . We are continuously expanding our search functions and recently added new search features to the photo galleries. For example, you can now use the photo ID number to go directly to a photo, and can move around much more efficiently in the galleries. . New servers for E-Flora were also installed in 2009. This was a big task that involved not only hardware upgrades but also extensive software upgrades. Changes to the Microsoft software that provides the framework for E-Flora meant that most programs had to be extensively revised in order to continue to display E-Flora as we see it today. . Our photo galleries continue to grow, and we now have more than 12,000 photos available, thanks to the more than 300 photographers who are supporting the project. Photos continue to be vetted for accuracy of identification, thanks to the efforts of several botanical experts and site users who review and comment on the galleries. BOOK REVIEW: THE MURDER OF NIKOLAI VAVILOV From: Dr. Barry Mendel Cohen, 239 Hibiscus Court, Brownsville, TX 78520 drbarry44@hotmail.com Pringle, Peter. 2008. The murder of Nikolai Vavilov: The story of Stalin's persecution of one of the great scientists of the twentieth century. Simon & Schuster, New York. xii+370 p. ISBN-13: 978-0-7432-6498-3 [hard cover] Price: US$26.00 Available from: Simon & Schuster Sales at 1-800-456-6798 or e-mail business@simon&schuster.com Peter Pringle is an accomplished author and journalist who has written an intelligent and scholarly biography of Nikolai Vavilov which is thoughtful, accurate and moving. Pringle's other biologically oriented books include _Food Inc._ and _Cornered: Big tobacco at the bar_. As Moscow bureau chief for _The Indipendent_ UK newspaper, he became interested in the life of the pre-eminent Russian plant geneticist Nikolai Ivanovich Vavilov, and in doing so became friends with Vavilov's son Yuri Vavilov, who provided him with much personal information relating to his father's arrest in 1940. Pringle also was in contact with Dr. Zhores Aleksandrovich Medvedev who was exiled from the former Soviet Union in 1973 and who wrote _The rise and fall of T.D. Lysenko_. Pringle as well used a similar source, Dr. Valerii N. Soyfer's _Lysenko and tragedy of soviet science_ both of which highlight the Vavilov-Lysenko controversy. Morevover, Pringle did archival research himself in Russia, the UK, and the USA. This book is just based on the firmest of sources. Vavilov holds a high place in the history of genetics, alongside his professor and colleague, William Bateson. After graduating from the Moscow Agricultural Institute in 1910, Vavilov journeyd to England to study with Bateson. Returning to Russia at the outbreak of World War I, Vavilov took up a position at Saratov University where he developed two important agricultural theories. The first was the _Law of Homologous Series in Variation_ (published in Russian in 1920 and later in English, see Vavilov 1922) which states that related biological species tend to parallel each other in hereditary variability. Is then worthwhile to search for similar varieties of related species in nature. This law is useful, but does not provide absolute predictability. The second important Vavilov's theory is the _Centers of Origin for Cultivated Plants_. This theory assumes that agriculture developed historically where the greatest variety of given domesticated species existed in the wild. According to Vavilov, there were about eight major regions in the world where most of the cultivated plants have originated. Peter Pringle, however, believes that Vavilov's greatest contribution was development of the World Collection of Cultivated Plants and details its modern version in Norway. The Alfred P. Sloan Foundation was wise to support Pringle's work and has done a great service to the history of genetics. Pringle's biography is an excellent work and will be the standard for years to come. Additional reading (added by the BEN editor): Cohen, B.M. 1991. Nikolai Ivanovich Vavilov: The explorer and plant collector. _Economic Botany_ 45:38-46. Dobzhansky, T. 1947. N.I. Vavilov, a martyr of genetics 1887-1942. _Journal of Heredity_ 38:226-232. http://lysvav.narod.ru/Files/J_Hered_47-38-8_P226-232.pdf. Soyfer V. N. 1994. _ Lysenko and the tragedy of soviet science._ Rutgers University Press, New Brunswick, NJ. Vavilov, N.I. 1922. The law of homologous series in variation. _Journal of Genetics_ 12: 47-89. BOOK ANNOUNCEMENT: BRYOPHYTES AND SEEDLESS VASCULAR PLANTS (ENGLER'S SYLLABUS PT. 3) Gebr. Borntraeger Publishers are pleased to announce the publication of the first installment of the 13th edition of Engler's Syllabus of Plant Families, covering Bryophytes and seedless Vascular Plants. Part3: Bryophytes and seedless Vascular Plants (Syllabus of Plant Families, Part 3) Edited by Wolfgang Frey. 13th ed., 2009. X, 419 p., 72 figs., 1 tab, hardcover, ISBN 978-3-443-01063- 8, EUR 89 The volume provides a state-of-the art, current and thorough treatment of the world-wide morphological and molecular diversity of a part of "lower" plants [Marchantiophyta, Bryophyta, Anthocerotophyta, Polysporangiomorpha, Protracheophytes, Rhyniophytina, Lycophytina, "Trimerophytina", Moniliformopses (Cladoxylopsida, Psilotopsida, Equisetopsida, Marattiopsida, Polypodiopsida)], and Radiatopses (Progymnospermopsida). The advent of DNA sequencing and advances in phylogenetic analysis has raised new interest in the relationships of liverworts, mosses, hornworts, ferns, and fern allies as extant representatives of early land plant evolution. Following the tradition of Engler with the morphological-anatomical data and incorporating latest results from molecular phylogenetics and phylogenomics, an up-to-date overview of families and genera has been created that will serve as reference for a long time. "Bryophytes and seedless Vascular Plants" should be on the bookshelf of any researcher concerned with bryophyte systematics. The complete Engler Syllabus book series will have five parts. The forthcoming volume covers the blue-green algae, myxomycetes and fungi. The new title is available through your bookseller or directly from Gebr. Borntraeger Science Publishers, Johannesstrasse 3a, 70176 Stuttgart, Germany. FAX: ++49-711-351456-99, phone ++49-711-351456-0 order@borntraeger-cramer.de www.borntraeger-cramer.de ________________________________________________________________ Subscriptions: http://victoria.tc.ca/mailman/listinfo/ben-l Send submissions to aceska@telus.net BEN is archived at http://www.ou.edu/cas/botany-micro/ben/ ________________________________________________________________