PLANT SCIENCE BULLETIN
A Publication of the Botanical Society of America, Inc.
March,
1969 Volume Fifteen Number One
Environments of Men and Molds—Another Look at The Emperor's New Clothes1
Ralph
Emerson University
of California, Berkeley
Introduction
President
Galston, honored guests. members of the Botanical Society of America, Good
Evening! This is a great honor you do me and I thank you for it. But, make
no mistake, it is also a forbidding task especially because, like Lawrence
Bragg, I have always held to the belief that speeches should be spoken not
read, no matter how large or distinguished the gathering. On this point Sir
Lawrence said, "I feel that to collect an audience and then read one's material
is like inviting a friend to go for a walk and asking him not to mind if you
go alongside him in your car."' Many speeches, of course, are even better
left unsaid. I must confess to the warmest admiration for that former officer
of ours who, so the story goes, tendered a check for some thousands of dollars
to our treasurer and sent his regrets to the guests who had assembled for
the annual dinner. He was a man of courage and doubtless his non-speech will
be remembered long after most BSA dinner speeches are forgotten.
Well
here, then, is the question that confronts me. Shall it be the ways of man
and the social implications of our profession, about which I have many thoughts
and deep feelings but little knowledge and no great powers of persuasion?
Or do I talk about the ways of those molds I love so much and about which
I have some knowledge and great enthusiasm? The former approach has certainly
been the more popular in years past, and a long line of distinguished speakers
has linked botany for us to the changing world, educational policy, the responsibilities
of citizenship, the Soviet Republic, biological ad-ministration, and other
equally weighty sociological goings-on. However, there have been a few hardy
souls who stayed closer to their knitting and delighted their audiences with
spritely tales of dung-inhabiting bryophytes from Arctic wastes, microscopic
algae to be won from God's green earth, or the gastronomic woes of idiotic
grass-hoppers chomping on idioblastic cells. My hat is off to these men! Wouldn't
most of us agree that plants are more interesting than people?
At
all events, my own decision, for better or worse, was to try mixing the two.
I recalled how Professor "Cap" Weston in days past had woven plants and people
together in his delightful essay on "Lower Plants and Higher Education."' Perhaps
I too might draw a contrast between men and molds. So the title of my talk tonight
is: Environments of Men and Molds—Another Look at "The Emperor's New Clothes."
I shall endeavor to show that molds have done far better than man in adjusting
effectively to the environments in which they have evolved. To botanists this
will come as no surprise. You will recognize that molds have been around and
on the job for a very long time in contrast to man's brief and ex-plosive efforts.
On the other hand we might have sup-posed that man, as a rational, reasoning,
and imaginative animal, would surely have outdistanced the fungi. That he has
not may well be because he is so prone to the swindle, the wooden nickel, the
soft sell.
From
this stems the second part of my title. As Harry Fuller,4 another Botanical
Society President, recognized on an earlier occasion, there has never been
a more piquant and persuasive account of the swindle than Hans Christian Andersen's
fairy tale "The Emperor's New Clothes." As you will remember, two confidence
men came to town offering to weave for the emperor such beautiful—and
expensive!—cloth that it could only be seen by the capable and pure
in heart. If you were ignorant, slovenly, generally incompetent, you would
not be able to see this fabulous material. Of course they wove nothing, although
going through elaborate motions in pre-tense and exhibiting the cloth for
all to see when it rolled off the loom. Naturally, too, no one from the Emperor
and his Chamberlain on down to the chief bottle washer and man in the street
wanted to admit he could see no cloth for none could admit to being ignorant
and incompetent. So, when the Emperor stepped forth to exhibit his new outfit,
he was received by all with great acclaim.•' There is no saying how
far that hoax might have gone had not a small boy in the crowd cried out with
glee, "Look, Mommy! The Emperor has no clothes on!"
We
shall return to the men and the Emperor shortly but first let us examine the
molds and consider how they have adapted themselves to two unusual environments.
Fungi Adapted to Extreme Environments
My
interest in these particular adaptations arose because of an abiding desire
to grow the living fungi in the laboratory and thereby study their activities.
In each case a fundamental aspect of evolutionary adaptation had to be
2
recognized
before the proper conditions for growth could be provided in the laboratory.
The first circumstance arose during World War II (Fig. 1) when it was my
good
fortune to be associated with Drs. Paul J. Allen and C. B. van Niel in an
investigation of the rotting of guayule. The rubber from this shrub could
be brought to an acceptable quality if the plants, whole or chopped, were
first subjected to a microbial decomposition.`' Molds were important agents
in this process and some of the most conspicuous and active ones could, at
first, neither be grown in the laboratory nor be identified in the litera-
| PLANT SCIENCE BULLETIN
|
| ADOLPH HECHT, Editor
Department of Botany
Washington State University
Pullman, Washington 99163 |
| EDITORIAL BOARD
Harlan P. Banks, Cornell University
Sydney S. Greenfield, Rutgers University
Robert W. Long, University of South Florida
William L. Stern, University of Maryland
Erich Steiner, University of Michigan |
| March 1969 Volume 16 |
Number One |
ture. It soon became apparent that, like compost or manure piles, guayule rets
underwent self-heating and we were dealing with a small group of then little-known
fungi adapted to grow at unusually high temperatures. They grew scarcely at
all at room temperature, throve at 45-50 C, and were often active even at 60
C. Out of this came ultimately a full account of thermophilic fungi.? The point
of importance here is that among the thousands of fungi in the world a few have
become adapted to grow in a habitat where the competition from their fellows
is virtually eliminated by high temperature. Not only are the thermophilic fungi
able to grow at elevated temperatures, what is more significant they do not
grow at temperatures which favor their would-be competitors.
The
second example of adaptation was even more striking. In a search for tropical
water molds in Costa Rica some ten years ago, I came across the extraordinary
phycomycete we have named Aqualinderella f ermentans.s Unlike its close relatives,
and for that matter all previously known fungi, A. fermentans showed no growth
of plated zoospores in pure culture until it was placed in a chamber containing
4 per cent CO,. Moreover it grew best in an atmosphere of Hs or N_ essentially
devoid of oxygen and with 20 per cent CO2.° Whereas the vast majority
of fungi are strongly aerobic, A. fermentans is a facultative anaerobe with
an obligately fermentative energy metabolism. Here is a fungus specially adapted
to grow on submerged fruits in warm stagnant waters where the levels of O2
are so low and the levels of CO2 are so high10 that all the common fungi are
eliminated from competition. Once again we find a fungus superbly adapted
to live under those very conditions that are inimical to its competitors.
These
two examples can serve to illustrate how fungi have evolved to fill countless
habitats and environments over the earth's surface. Down through the ages
they, like all the other living things—except man—have adjusted
to the world in which they live. Now let us turn to man, man who prides himself
on his capacity to shape the environment to suit his needs. Here again I have
selected two environments, one small and close to home, The University Environment,
the other wide and all about us, we may simply call The World Environment.
I shall take the University first and ask you to recall the Emperor. For the
question before us is whether the environment man has created is a good one
or whether he has sold himself a bill of goods? Is the Emperor's suit made
of whole cloth or is it shot full of holes? Before you jump to the conclusion
that such large questions are outside the purview of a mycologist, let me
remind you that mush-rooms and toadstools have always had an intimate connection
with man's folklore, his most private affairs, his life and death (Fig. 2),
his daily shopping (Fig. 3), his space exploration (Fig. 4), and even his
wars (Fig. 5).
The
Little Swindle—The University Environment
An
environment that is of great personal importance to most of us here is the
University. Despite its small size in the general scheme of things, we know
that the University carries a tremendous social responsibility and, in the
long run, must be the source of information and ideas to expose any swindles
in the world environment we will turn
to
last. It is doubly important, therefore, that the University itself be alert
to possible hanky-panky within its own walls. Nothing is more demoralizing
than intramural swindles and nothing can bring down the house of intellect
nore quickly from its key position in society at large.
Despite
all that may be said—and a lot has been said
universities
are institutions of learning in which, it students and teachers work objectively
together to dis the truth, advance the frontiers of knowledge, and the coming
generations of truth seekers. This last is portant. Indeed it is generally
conceded to be the ori, function of a university. In an editorial" in 1964
em "The Appropriate Function of a University," Abelson st it very simply:
"Obviously it [the university] should primarily for educating the young. This
is the one fund which it can uniquely perform and, in the long view, most
important." We would also agree that graduate even advanced undergraduate
education is integrally sociated with research. The next development, howev
can be traced in Garrett Hardin's volume on "Nature a Man's Fate." 12 "As
it became generally recognized," . writes, "that an important fraction of
the world's researc in pure science was done by academic men, administrate
defined research as parr of the job and made productivit in research a criterion
for advancement." Furthermore he continues, "the consequences of this meddling
hay, been about what one would expect. There is now a ten dency to choose
research] projects that are pretty sure ro give quick results and to avoid
questions on tabooed subjects." And finally he adds: "As research has become
more expensive the academic man has had to develop a talent for begging."
The plot thickens considerably in this sequence when we conclude with these
pithy comments by Nobel Laureate J. J. Thomson who pointed out that ".. .
if you pay a man a salary for doing research, he and you will want to have
something to point to at the end of the year to show that the money has not
been wasted. In promising work of the highest class, however, results do not
come in this regular fashion, in fact years may pass without any tangible
results being obtained. . . . The only thing to do is to pay him for doing
something else and give him enough Ieisure to do research for the Iōve
of it.""
Now
where does this leave us? Ostensibly the some-thing else most of us in universities
get paid for is teaching. However, the quality and contribution of a teacher
are hard to judge, research is easier to measure or at least seems so, and
furthermore the distinction of the University rests upon the distinction of
its research so, ipso facto. research becomes the yard-stick for promotion.
We have then reached a unique position for as a writer in Science noted recently,
we are the only profession that is hired to do one thing—teach—and
promoted to do another—research.
As
a logical consequence of these several developments, the research pressures
in many if not most universities have become heavy, so heavy in fact as to
detract from teaching effort. Evidences of a serious imbalance in the educational
applecart are all around us. In the editorial by Philip Abelson noted just
above" he put the situation unequivocally: "Under the present rules of the
game," he says, "any scientist who teaches when he can do research must be
unusually public-spirited or blind to his own interest. The result is to demean
teaching. How," he asks, "can a professor approach a class with enthusiasm
and adequate preparation if he is convinced that education of under-graduates
is a secondary function of the university?" In a recent lead editorial in
Nature headed "How lnnr ,,,_
4
the
universities last?" the following statement appeared: "One consequence of
a more serious attempt to cater for the real educational needs of students
is likely to be that faculty members have less time for their own pursuits—research
for example."14 A staff writer in Science, discussing the competitive aspects
of faculty recruitment, is
equally
blunt. ". . . faculty members," he says, "should be aware that the picture
which increasingly emerges when professors discuss their condition is one
of men who are interested in using the universities primarily as bases for
their own activities, research, and well-being, and only secondarily as places
to teach students. On the other hand, most people outside the university (as
well as most students) believe that universities should be primarily teaching
institutions."':' In a most entertaining column in the popular press Art Buchwald
presents "One Man's View-point on Campus Revolts." "The reason," he quips,
"the college students are doing so much demonstrating is that there is no
one in the class to teach them anymore." m And, finally, coming home to the
fountainhead of student unrest, one of the numerous FSM (Free Speech Movement)
-spawned committees at Berkeley concluded last spring ". . . the national
and international reputations of both the University and its faculty rest
on published re-search, not on teaching . . . furthermore, the individual's
professional peers, the colleagues in his discipline through-out the world,
are almost exclusively concerned with the individual's research activities
and thus pay no heed to his
excursions
into the realms of education. ... he is aware that neither his institution
nor his colleagues seem to attach much value to teaching."'' They went on
to state "We think ... that a 'credibility gap' exists between official statements
about the central importance of teaching and the day-to-day operating priorities
of the University." Now "credibility gap" is merely the modern way to express
doubt about the cloth of the Emperor's new clothes. The implication is clear
that someone is tactfully trying to expose a swindle.
The
"Publish or Perish" philosophy carried to extremes has a variety of other
anti-adaptational effects in the university environment. The struggling young
scientist—and not so young too—faced with a need to provide the
requisite list of titles come the end of each academic year has resorted to
a variety of practices that are at least open to question. A sound block of
research, representing a coordinated monographic unit, is purposely fragmented
into bits to provide additional titles, each with its overlapping—frequently
identically worded—introduction, materials and methods, and bibliography.
The series appears as "The path of nitrogen, parts I to XLVIII" (to borrow
from my humorous friend, R. Arnold Le Win) .'s Incidentally, each of the 48
parts, assuming it is worth noting, must have a separate index card entry;
each, assuming it is worth having, requires a separate reprint request; and
each must be housed and kept track of in a reprint col-
5
lection,
assuming such a collection is now worth the effort. Surely a strange adaptation
to an environment already complicated by the information explosion. Whatever
James Bonner may say about the bad old days, there was some-thing very satisfying
about an afternoon spent in the quiet of the Farlow Library reading a 150-page
paper with one title, one author, and one set of conclusions representing
perhaps the culmination of five years of work. No wonder we shall need data
storage and retrieval machines to keep track of those one-page papers that
are upon us.
Then
there is the matter of authorship. Aside from the team efforts whose authorship
approaches in column inches the text of the paper itself, there are the graduate
students. Again in those bad old days, professors of biology at least, if
not chemistry, were proud to have their students publish their doctoral theses
under their own names. Not so today. A young professor is missing out if he
doesn't avail himself of this opportunity for swelling his publication list.
Indeed a young colleague made it very clear to me not long ago that the primary
purpose of having graduate students was so that they could get the work out
for you and keep those publications rolling.
These,
then, are the good new days, but sooner or later some lad is going to raise
his voice loud and clear and tell us all that the cloth is full of holes and
the Emperor looks mighty shoddy. I'm inclined to believe, in fact, that the
voices are already being raised. Several first-rate students I have known
recently have reacted very negatively to the University environment. No doubt
that has something to do with their turning away from science or their search
for teaching positions in small out-of-the-way colleges. If we want to weave
whole cloth for the University, for Science, for the World in which we live,
we'd better keep an ear to the ground for that young fellow who has the simple,
direct honesty to tell us when the Emperor has no clothes on.
The
Big Swindle—The World Environment
Last we come to the beautiful world around us, the planet Earth. Every one
in this room knows what man has done to the good earth. Happily the journals,
both technical and popular, and increasing numbers of books are setting the
story before people who can read and are interested. Lamont Cole, "Can the world
be saved?";" Kingsley Davis, "Population Policy, will current programs succeed?";20
Justice Douglas, "An Inquest on our Lakes and Rivers";2' the Paddocks, "Famine—1975!"22
Secretary Udall, "The Quiet Crisis""—these are but a few of the signs
that mankind is beginning to be aware of the massive impact the human species
has had upon the planet and the consequences that must be faced. I scarcely
need to remind you of Lake Tahoe or Lake Erie, of Silent Spring or the fish
kill in the Mississippi, or of the Governor (and erstwhile presidential aspirant!)
who says of the great sequoias, "When you have seen one you've seen them all."
My
own awareness has grown surely and deeply over the years as a few reminiscences
will illustrate. As a mop-pet being brought up in the early 1920's in Manhattan,
I often remarked upon the reddish haze that smarted my eyes and obscured the
outline of the looming sky-scrapers.'' That, I was told, is "heat haze." What
a euphemism! It was a long time later that I realized the heat haze of my
childhood was the ugly mantle that would shroud Los Angeles and every major
industrial and population center of the developed world. Then there was one
of those moments, vividly recalled, when awaiting the change of a traffic
signal on Park Avenue, my father, then nearing the end of a career as a physician
and Professor of Public Health, deeply committed to protecting human life,
turned to me, I thought sadly, and said, "Medicine has brought excessive population
upon us; medicine must find some solution." At college I read with wonder
and growing concern the first and perhaps most inspired of Paul Sears' volumes,
"Deserts on the March, a book that should be required reading for every high
school student through-out the world. It was thirty years thereafter that
I sailed among the Greek Islands marvelling at their ancient history and the
lives men led there 5000 years or more ago. At Knossos, where Sir Arthur Evans
recreated the palace—to the dismay of pure archaeology but to my delight—I
marked the strapping two-foot wooden beams replicated in brown cement. Where,
I asked, were such great trees to be found? Pointing to the scarred, utterly
barren slopes of the nearby hills, my informant spoke of forests of great
cedars all around the eastern Mediterranean. First I imagined with joy what
a glory it must have been, but then my mind's eye moved westward through the
Mediterranean, the bare lands of Southern Italy, the dry bleak hills of Spain,
even the green fields of jolly England, once covered with mighty oaks. Travelling
swiftly I crossed the Atlantic, whipped through the scrubby woods of the eastern
seaboard across our great land, and came at last to the redwood forests on
the Pacific Coast. "When you've seen one you've seen them all!" That must
be what some enterprising Greek admiral had said, some Roman general, some
Spanish Don or English Lord (Fig. 6). Evidently, whatever anyone else might
say, the progress of each of these great civilizations had depended to a major
extent upon a deterioration of the natural environment. Was this the greatest
of all swindles? Had the promoters, the developers, the advertisers, the leaders,
the advocates of progress sold mankind a bill of goods? Was this whole cloth
for the Emperor's new suit or was he marching down the street naked, afraid
to recognize the truth?
The
answer is not simple. I live in a wooden house, own a gasoline-burning car,
fly to Washington ahead of a foul jet-stream, and reside in the world's richest
agricultural area where crops are seeded and fertilized by air and sprayed
with tons of pest-controlling chemicals. I enjoy all the benefits of civilization.
Still, I wonder if it will prove worth it in the long run. I am inclined to
believe that the Emperor is wearing little more than a new jockstrap and we
should take a sharp look at the motives and principles of the people who are
weaving the cloth.
If
a man wants to get to the moon has anyone figured
6
the
cost in terms of irreplaceable resources used and contamination of the environment,
let alone the human energy and ingenuity desperately needed elsewhere? When
wars are planned and fought, does anyone weigh in the balance the rape of
the earth? In his documentary study of British Admiralty records, John Ramsbottom,
one-time Keeper of Botany in the British Museum, came to the inescapable conclusion
that it cost Britain all her forests to rule the waves for 300 years." No
doubt the same was true for Greece and Rome and Spain in bygone days. Later,
it was steel and coal and now it is oil and chemicals by the megaton and thousands
of drums of radioactive waste hid-den away, out of sight out of mind. It is
said that defense demands the testing of atomic bombs and the defoliation
of vast areas of tropical forest. Tinbergen stated recently that "Man is the
only species that is a mass murderer, the only misfit in his own society."'
It must be added that he is the only species busily ruining his own environment
and that his propensity for mass murder is one of the major factors in this
ruination. Tinbergen also said, "It is an old cultural phenomenon that warriors
are both brain-washed and bullied into all-out fighting."' Obviously brainwashing
and bullying are not confined to the warriors. Are there any small boys about?
We need to know whether the Emperor is in his birthday suit.
Man
has sold his fellows another more subtle and very probably much more serious
bill of goods. Ever since the very beginning, "Progress" has meant more people.
For thousands of years society has encouraged itself to multiply whether for
fighters, farmers, laborers, religious supporters, helpers in old age, or
just plain John Q. Public with the consumer dollar. Perhaps agriculture was
the first major step in the progression and, on the face of it, farming seems
like a harmless and natural process. But it was soon overdone and cradles
of civilization became desert wastes. Man moved on to new fields but now there
is no place to go and there are all these people still encouraging themselves
to multiply. By dint of agricultural and chemical technocracy that threatens
the balance of nature as never before we are proudly extracting the ultimate
calory, ingeniously making a bit more protein, talking big about making food
in factories. But the chips are down, the game is up, there are too many people.
Yet even today, with the world's population doubling every 30 years and rates
of population increase rising even faster than the most extreme predictions,
why are whole nations, whole religions, and whole societies opposed to birth
control, often precisely where control is most obviously needed? Man's failure
to recognize and act upon this problem may be his undoing, and this failure
has to be chalked up to the biggest swindle, antiadaptation if you will, of
all time. And this time a small boy won't do the job. We need a big man with
a mighty voice to tell the world the Emperor is stark naked. For this purpose
we need the very forces that have perpetrated the swindle. Consider what could
be done by a world education campaign organized by American advertising, backed
by the Russian propaganda mill, approved by the Vatican, and supported by
the $100 billion a year that mankind puts into armaments and defense! Which
means more to us, selling obsolete arms to Latin America or selling birth
control? We've got to get that cloth woven and put some honest--to-god clothes
on the Emperor's back. We must begin by recognizing and accepting a realistic
appraisal of the present situation. Kingsley Davis and the Paddocks urge us
to quit kidding ourselves and face up to the swindle. If men stop multiplying
they might learn to stop fighting and then they might have time to discover
how to adapt to their natural environment as well as the molds have done.
Conclusion
What
we have been talking about is man's progress, whether he has been moving onward
and upward or whether
7
his
span on earth is more accurately depicted in Figure 7. Obviously Botany has
a great deal to do with this, and it is up to us to see that man's efforts
are not devoted exclusively to explosive chemistry (Fig. 8). I urge you, therefore,
to cast your eyes upon the Emperor's New Clothes" s and ask yourselves again
how we can weave whole cloth.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
To
those students and friends who lent support to this venture, I extend warm
thanks. The generous permission of artists, authors, and publishers to reproduce
their works here is also gratefully acknowledged.
NOTES
-
Abbreviated
version of the address of the retiring President of the Botanical Society
of America, presented at the Society's annual banquet, September 5, 1968,
at Columbus, Ohio.
-
BRAGG,
L. 1966. The art of talking about science. Science 154: 1613-1616. Quoted,
by permission of the author and publisher, from p. 1614 of the 30 Dec.
1966 issue. Copy-right 1966 by the American Association for the Advancement
of Science.
-
WESTON,
W. H. 1941. Lower plants and higher education. Amer. Biol. Teacher 3:
189-195.
i.
FULLER, H. J. 1951. The emperor's new clothes, or prius dementat. Sci. Monthly
72: 32-41.
5.
The interested reader will find illustrations of the emperor on parade in
the various editions of Andersen's fairy talcs. An especially delightful colored
rendition, used as the first slide in this talk, appears on page 215 in: Andersen,
H. 1911. Stories from Hans Andersen with illustrations by Edmund Dulac, 258
p. Hodder and Stoughton, New York.
The
caption for this illustration, on page 214, goes as follows: "Then the Emperor
walked along in the procession under the gorgeous canopy, and everybody in
the streets and at the windows exclaimed, `How beautiful the Emperor's new
clothes are!"'
6.
ALLEN. P. J. AND RALPH EMERSON. 1949. Guayule rubber. Microbiological improvement
by shrub resting. lnd. Eng. Chem. 41: 346-365.
7.
COONEY, D. G., AND RALPH EMERSON. 1964. Thermophilic fungi, an account of
their biology, activities, and classification, 200 p. W. H. Freeman, San Francisco.
8.
EMERSON, RALPH. AND W. H. WESTON. 1967. Aqualinderella fernzentans gen. et
sp. nov., a phycomycete adapted to stagnant waters. I. Morphology and occurrence
in nature. Amer. J. Bot. 54: 702-719.
9.
EMERSON, RALPH, AND A. A. HELD. 1969. Agvalinder•ella f ermentans gen.
et sp. nov., a phycomycete adapted to stagnant waters. II. Isolation, cultural
characteristics, and gas relations. Amer. J. Bot. 56: (in press).
10.
A. fermentans has been found by Bandoni (see Bandoni, R. J., and J. D. Parsons.
1966. Some aquatic phycomycetes from Pine Hills. Trans. Ill. State Acad. Sci.
59: 91-94) in swamps in southern Illinois where Parsons (personal communication)
reports oxygen levels virtually zero and carbon dioxide up to 3000 gM/liter
in the summer months under a dense mat of floating vegetation.
11.
ABELSON, P. H. 1964. The appropriate function of a university. Science 143:
11. Quoted, by permission of the author and publisher, from p. 11 of the 3
Jan. 1964 issue. Copyright 1964 by the American Association for the Advancement
of Science.
12.
HARDIN, GARRETT. 1959. Nature and man's fate, 387 p. Rinehart & Co., Inc.,
New York. Quoted, by permismission of the author, from pp. 344 and 345.
13.
RAYLEIGH, R. J. S. 1943. The life of Sir J. J. Thomson, 309 p. Cambridge University
Press, Cambridge. Quoted, by permission of Lord Rayleigh and the publisher,
from p. 199.
14.
Editor. Nature Magazine. 1968. How long can the uni versities last? Nature
218: 997. Quoted, by permission of the author and publisher.
15.
NELSON, BRYCE. 1968. Harvard faculty: how can you keep 'em after they've seen
California? Science 160: 977-978. Quoted, by permission of the author and
publisher, from p. 978 of the 31 May 1968 issue. Copyright 1968 by the American
Association for the Advancement of Science.
16.
BUCHWALD, ART. 1967? One man's viewpoint on cam-pus revolts. Washington Post.
Quoted, by permission of the author. (Reproduced in full in University Bulletin,
University of California, 15(33): 146, April 10, 1967.)
17.
University of California. 1968. Report of the committee on teaching. Notice,
meeting of the Berkeley Division of the Academic Senate, June 3, 1968, pp.
7-13. Quoted, by permission of Professor Herma H. Kay. Chairman of the Committee,
from pp. 7, 8, and 9.
18.
LE WIN. R. ARNOLD. 1963. Logarithmic and arythmic expression of a physiological
function. In, Baker, R. A. [ed.] A stress analysis of a strapless evening
gown. Prentice-I-fall, Inc., N.J. Following arc selected references quoted,
by permission of Dr. Ralph A. Lewin. from p. 147.
-
Juan,
Don; Smith, Phillis; Hatsui, Irene; Fullmann, Her-
mione;
Myschawa, Jane; Blz, Bella; Smith, Phyllis; and
Oginski,
Thelma. Trapstocachuamycin, a new antibiotic.
J.
Biol. Chem., 67: 1056-1066, 1951.
-
Melville,
H. The path of nitrogen. XLVIII. N''_ fixation and N'I-ls . CO •
N"H, production in Chilean onions. Arch. Biochem. Biophys., 40: 15-18,
1956.
-
Melville,
H.. Washington, G., Lincoln, A., and Cadillac, de V. The path of nitrogen.
CXL. Absence of demonstrable N''I-h. • CO • N"H, production
and N''sfixation in Spanish onions. Arch. Biochem. Biophys.. 41: 156-160,
1957.
-
Shadrach,
C., Meshach, H., and Abednego, H. and C. An anaerobic heat resistant monoflagellate
ornirhine producing sulfur non-purple bacterium isolated from the rectum
of a goat. J. Bact., 70: 1-11, 1944.
19.
COLE, L. C. 1968. .Can the world be saved? BioSci. 18: 679-684.
20.
DAvis, KINGSLEY. 1967. Population policy: will current programs succeed? Science
158: 730-739.
21.
DOUGLAS, W. O. 1968. An inquest on our lakes and rivers. Playboy 15(6) : 96-98
and 177-181.
22.
PADDOCK, WILLIAM. AND PAUL PADDOCK. 1967. Famine -1975! 286 p. Little Brown.
Boston.
8
-
UDALL,
S. L. 1963. The quiet crisis. 312 p. Holt. Rine-hart and Winston, New
York.
-
GRAHAM,
FRANK, JR. 1968. The breath of death. Audubon (magazine) 70(4) : 48-58.
On p. 48 (July/August issue) is a color picture much as I remember the
same scene 50 years ago.
-
SEARS,
P. B. 1959. Deserts on the march [3d. edn., rev.], 192 p. University of
Oklahoma Press, Norman. (First published in 1935.)
-
RAMSBOTTOM,
JOHN. 1937. Dry rot in ships. Essex Naturalist 25: 231-267.
-
TINBERGEN,
N. 1968. On war and peace in animals and man. Science 160: 1411-1418.
Quoted, by permission of the author and publisher, from pp. 1412 and 1415
of the 28 June 1968 issue. Copyright 1968 by the American Association
for the Advancement of Science.
-
As
a further guide to the complexities of this whole issue, the reader will
find food for thought in a magnificent modern rendition of the Emperor.
used as the last slide of this talk, if he refers to Playboy for April
1968 (Vol. 15, No. 4. p. 83). The caption reads: "I don't think much of
the Emperor's new clothes, but did you get a load of the Empress?"
NOTES
FROM THE EDITOR
As
most of you know, the XI International Botanical Congress will be held at
Seattle, Washington beginning August 24, 1969. The week before this Congress
there will be two other science meetings at which botanists may have an opportunity
to present papers and participate in the sessions: the Pacific Division of
the A.A.A.S. will meet at Washington State University, Pullman, and the A.I.B.S.
will hold its sessions during this same period at the University of Vermont,
Burlington.
The
American Society of Horticultural Science (national organization), the Western
Section of the American Society of Plant Physiologists, and the Pacific Section
of the Botanical Society of America are among the groups that are planning
sessions at the Pacific Division meetings in Pullman. A Pre-Congress Conference
on Pollen and Pollen Physiology is also being organized. A.A.A.S. members
in the area of the Pacific Division will soon receive copies of the Preliminary
Program for these meetings; others may obtain copies by writing to Dr. Robert
C. Miller, Secretary, Pacific Division, A.A.A.S., California Academy of Sciences,
Golden Gate Park, San Francisco, California, 94118.
An
A.I.B.S. Special Plant Science Session will be held as part of the A.I.B.S.
annual meeting at the University of Vermont. Botanists who wish to present
a paper are invited to send a title and an abstract (not to exceed 300 words)
to the organizing committee: Plant Science Session, Marsh Life Sciences Building,
University of Vermont, Burlington, Vermont 05401. Titles and abstracts must
be mailed before April 1, 1969.
We
note with regret the passing of two well-known emeritus botanists, formerly
associated with the University of Michigan. Emeritus Professor Edwin B. Mains,
former Director of the Herbarium, University of Michigan, died on December
23, 1968 at the age of 78. Emeritus Professor Felix G. Gustafson, discoverer
of the induction of parthenocarpy through hormone treatment, died on January
13, 1969 at the age of 80.
NEWS
AND NOTES
New
York Botanical Garden Announces Title Changes
The
Board of Managers of The New York Botanical Gar-den has approved the elevation
in title of first echelon administrative officers. These new titles not only
reflect the greater responsibilities imposed by the long-range development
program, they also express more clearly the duties and status of each officer.
President
Charles B. Harding has announced the five changes in title:
Dr.
William C. Steere, from Director to Executive Director.
Dennis
A. Brown, from Assistant Director (Horticulture and Maintenance) to Director
of Horticulture.
Carl
Dobrin, from Assistant Director (Development) to Director of Development.
Robert
F. Kolkebeck, from Assistant Director (Administration) to Director of Finance.
Dr.
Bassett Maguire, from Assistant Director (Botany) to Director of Botany.
Jesse
M. Greenman Award
The
Jesse M. Greenman Award of the Missouri Botanical Garden will be given to
a botanical systematist for the best thesis paper published during the preceding
calendar year. The award of $100 is sponsored by the Missouri Botanical Garden
Alumni Association. The award will be presented during the American Botanical
Society Banquet at the 1969 AIBS meetings in Burlington, Vermont. Papers submitted
should have been published during calendar year 1968 and result from M.S.
or Ph.D. thesis research in plant systematics. Papers submitted for consideration
should reach the following address before 1 May ].969:
David
M. Gates, Director
Missouri
Botanical Garden
2315
Tower Grove Avenue
St.
Louis, Missouri 63110
Summer
Research Participation at Oklahoma State
Positions
are open for five predoctoral and two postdoctoral participants who are college
teachers of biological sciences in areas of plant physiology, physiological
genetics, plant ecology, plant taxonomy, and plant pathology. The ten-week
session starts June 4, 1969. Apply to Glenn W. Todd, Director, Summer Research
Participation Pro-gram, Department of Botany and Plant Pathology, Oklahoma
State University, Stillwater, Oklahoma 74074.
1969
Summer Program in Botany University of Washington
The
summer program of courses for this year is an especially interesting one.
The nine-week session precedes the XI International Botanical Congress which
will be held on the Seattle campus August 24 to September 2.
Much
of the course work will be taught by visiting botanists. Four seminar series
are anticipated. At Friday Harbor, two courses for graduate students are offered.
9
On
the Seattle campus:
Botany
111 Elementary Botany; Assistant Professor Haskins.
Botany
113 Elementary Plant Classification; Visiting Associate Professor John McNeill,
Hartley Botanical Laboratories, University of Liverpool.
Botany
371 Elementary Plant Physiology; Visiting Associate Professor Michael Black,
Queen Elizabeth College, London.
Botany
450 and 451 Terrestrial Plant Ecology; Visiting Professor Grant Cottam, University
of Wisconsin; and Assistant Professor Roger del Moral.
Botany
463 Phycomycetes; Professor D. E. Strtz; and Visiting Associate Professor
Lewis G. Willoughby, The Freshwater Laboratories, Windermere, England.
Botany
468 Biology of the Slime Molds; Visiting Associate Professor O. Ray Collins,
Wayne State University.
Botany
521 Topics in Plant Physiology
Botany
522 Seminar in Taxonomy
Botany
523 Selected Topics in Mycology
Botany
525 Topics in Ecology
At
Friday Harbor:
Botany
545 Marine Algology (first half of summer) Associate Professor Richard E.
Norris; and Visiting Associate Professor A. D. Boney, University of Wales,
Aberystwyth.
Botany
575 Problems in Algal Physiology (second half of summer) Visiting Associate
Professor William Vidaver, Simon Fraser University, B.C., and Dr. J. A. Gross,
Indiana State University, Terre Haute.
Further
information may be obtained from the Office of the Summer Session; Office
of the Friday Harbor Lab-oratories; or from the Botany Department, Seattle,
Washington 98105.
Gatlinburg
Wildflower Pilgrimage
The
19th Annual Wildflower Pilgrimage will be held in Gatlinburg, Tennessee and
surrounding territory April 24-26, 1969. It is sponsored by the Botany Department
of the University of Tennessee, the Great Smoky Mountains National Park, the
Gatlinburg Chamber of Commerce, and the Gatlinburg Garden Club. Motorcades
and trail hikes under expert leadership take you to areas where spring wildflowers
grow in quantity and variety. Morning bird walks are a feature of each day's
activities. Special programs are arranged for photographers, and there is
an opportunity to show one's own slides.
Each
evening there are illustrated lectures on features of the natural history
of the Appalachians, a coffee social, and a plant identification clinic. Detailed
descriptions of each Pilgrimage activity are furnished at the time of registration.
For
further information, write Dept. W. P., Gatlin-burg Chamber of Commerce, Box
527, Gatlinburg, Tennesee 37738, or Dr. Edward E. C. Clebsch, Department of
Botany, The University of Tennessee, Knoxville, Tennessee 37916.
Pre-Convention
Conference 1970
Prior
to the 1968 AIBS meetings in Columbus a pre-convention conference was held
(September 1 and 2) sponsored jointly by AIBS and The Botanical Society of
America, Education Committee.
The
subject of that conference, "Morphogenesis of Plants," was chosen because
of your letters responding to our request in the Plant Science Bulletin. The
success of the conference has been expressed in several ways, among them a
unanimous vote of those in attendance that another such conference be held
in 1970 before the AIBS meetings.
This
is an appeal to you, as a member of The Botanical Society of America, to make
recommendations for a general theme, or particular subjects around which we
can identify a theme, or particular speakers. In making these suggestions
please bear in mind that the purpose of the conference is to update those
among us who by reason of specialization or preoccupation with teaching have
not kept abreast of all exciting frontiers in Botany and Biology. These frontiers
will beckon undergraduate students into advanced work only when they are presented
well by their instructors.
Our
preliminary plans for the 1970 conference must
go to AIBS in June if they are to seek NSF funding for
us. Please send your suggestions as soon as possible to us.
Dr, Helena A. Miller
Duquesne University
Pittsburgh, Pa. 15219
International
Symposium on Statistical Ecology Under the sponsorship of the International
Association of Ecology, an International Symposium on Statistical Ecology
is scheduled to be held during August 21-28, 1969, at Yale University and
the U.S. Forest Service Research Laboratory, New Haven, Connecticut, U.S.A.,
with support from Ford Foundation, The Pennsylvania State University, The
University of British Columbia, the U.S. Forest Service and Yale University.
The
primary objective of the proposed symposium is to provide opportunity for
an exchange of ideas and in-formation between ecologists and mathematicians-statisticians-systems
analysts, with particular emphasis on approaches and techniques applicable
to the solution of man-environment problems or significant components thereof.
Ample time would be available for interested students and researchers to meet
and discourse with the professional scientists and specialists as well as
to attend the formal sessions. In all sessions suitable time will be allowed
for discussion. Invited and selected presentations together with preplanned
and spontaneous discussions are expected to appear in the published Proceedings
of the Symposium.
With
an international organizing committee consisting of E. Batschelet, D. R. Cox,
J. Gani, D. W. Goodall, J. Gulland, C. S. Holling, H. Klomp, V. Labeyrie,
B. Matern, C. R. Rao, V. Schultz, J. G. Skellam, L. R. Taylor, E. J. Williams
with G. P. Patil, E. C. Pielou and W. E. Waters as co-chairmen, the symposium
is expected to cover the subject areas such as: Growth and regulation of populations,
interacting populations, systems analysis and ecological prediction, productivity
and the energy relations of ecosystems, population diffusion and migration,
classification
10
and
ordination of communities and discrimination problems, compiling and interpreting
ecological maps, distribution and abundance of species and species diversity,
spatial patterns, homogeneity in vegetation, model making in ecology, distributions
in ecology, sampling biological populations: fundamentals and principles,
aggregation: meaning and measurement and research and training programs in
statistical ecology.
Invitees
who have accepted invitations to participate include: D. J. Anderson, C. Auer,
W. Baltensweiler, M. S. Bartlett, C. I. Bliss, M. T. Boswell, K. O. Bowman,
D. R. Cox, P. Dagnelic, G. M. Furnival, J. Gani, R. L. Giese, M. Godron, P.
Greig-Smith; N. G. Hairston, G. P. Harris, W. H. Hatheway, P. Holgate, C.
S. Holling, J. Kane, C. D. Kemp, K. A. Kershaw, H. Klomp, V. Labeyrie, L.
P. Lefkovitch, M. Lloyd, B. Matern, D. B. Mertz, M. Morisita, J. E. Mosimann,
M. D. Mountford, G. Murdie, E. P. Odum, L. Orloci, G. P. Patil, O. Persson,
J. Murca Pires, C. R. Rao, L. R. Shenton, J. G. Skcllam, L. B. Slobodkin,
F. E. Smith, W. M. Stiteler, Paul Switzer, L. R. Taylor, G. M. VanDyne, W.
G. Warren, W. E. Waters, K. E. F. Watt, R. W. Wilson, R. G. Wright.
It
is possible that a few selected contributed papers would have a place in the
symposium program. The symposium is open for attendance for all those interested.
Further information may be available from any member of the organizing committee,
including:
Professor
G. P. Patil, Program Co-Chairman Department of Statistics, 302 McAllister
Building The Pennsylvania State University
University
Park, Pennsylvania 16802
BOTANICAL
SOCIETY OF AMERICA, INC.
OFFICERS FOR 1969
PRESIDENT: Harlan
P. Banks
Div.
of Biological Sciences 214 Plant Science Bldg. Cornell University
Ithaca,
New York, 14850 VICE-PRESIDENT: B. L. Turner
Department
of Botany University of Texas
Austin,
Texas, 78712
SECRETARY: Richard
C. Starr (1965-69) Department of Botany Indiana University Bloomington, Indiana,
47401
TREASURER: Theodore
Delevoryas (1968-
72)
Department
of Biology
Yale
University
New
Haven, Connecticut. 06520
PROGRAM
DIRECTOR: C. Ritchie Bell (1967-69) Department of Botany
University of North Carolina Chapel Hill, North Carolina,
27514
EDITORIAL
COMMITTEE: William Stern (1967-69) Department of Botany University
of Maryland College Park, Maryland,
20740
Leonard
Machlis (1968-70) Department of Botany University of California Berkeley,
California, 94720
Harold
C. Bold (1969-71) Department of Botany University of Texas
Austin,
Texas, 78712 EDITOR, Charles Heimsch
AMERICAN Department
of Botany
JOURNAL
OF BOTANY Miami University Oxford, Ohio, 45056
EDITOR, Adolph
Hecht
PLANT
SCIENCE BULLETIN: Department of Botany Washington State University
Pullman, Washington, 99163
BUSINESS
MANAGER, Lawrence J. Crockett
AMERICAN The
City College
JOURNAL
OF BOTANY University of the City of New York
Convent
Avenue & 139th St. New York, New York, 10031
SECTIONAL
OFFICERS AND COUNCIL
MEMBERS FOR 1969'
.PAST
PRESIDENT, 1968: 'Arthur Galston Department of Biology
Yale
University
New
Haven. Connecticut, 06520
PAST
PRESIDENT, 1967: Ralph Emerson
Department
of Botany University of California Berkeley, California, 94720
PAST
PRESIDENT, 1966: *Harold C. Bold Department of Botany The
University of Texas Austin, Texas, 78712
DEVELOPMENTAL
SECTION: 'Ian Sussex
Chairman
(1968) : Department of Biology Yale University
New
Haven, Connecticut, 06520
Vice-Chairman
(1968) : Richard M. Klein Department of Botany University
of Vermont Burlington, Vermont, 05401
Secretary
(1966-69) : William T. Jackson
Dept.
of Biological Sciences Dartmouth College
Hanover,
New Hampshire, 03755
GENERAL
SECTION:
Chairman
(1969-70): Richard H. Eyde Department of Botany Smithsonian
Institution Washington, D.C., 20560
Vice-Chairman
(1969-70): Charles H. Uhl
Division
of Biological Sciences
Plant
Science Bldg.
Cornell
University
Ithaca,
New York. 14850
Secretary-Treasurer
(1969-70): 'David Bierhorst
Department
of Botany University of Massachusetts Amherst, Massachusetts,
01002
HISTORICAL
SECTION:
Chairman
(1969) : Edmund Berkeley Department of Biology University
of North Carolina Greensboro, North Carolina,
27410
Vice-Chairman
(1969): Emanuel D. Rudolph Dept. of Botany &
Plant
Pathology
Ohio
State University Columbus, Ohio, 43210
Secretary-Treasurer
(1966-69): ',Jerry W. Stannard Department of History University of Kansas
Lawrence, Kansas, 66044
11
MICROBIOLOGICAL
SECTION:
Chairman
(1969) : Vernon Ahmadjian Professor of Botany University
of Massachusetts Amherst, Massachusetts,
01002
Vice-Chairman
(1969) : Roger A. Goos
Department
of Botany University of Hawaii Honolulu, Hawaii, 96822
Secretary
(1966-69) : Dorothy I. Fennell 13201 Parklawn Drive American
Type Culture
Collection
Rockville,
Maryland, 20852
Representative
to the Council *Alma W. Barksdale
(1966-69)
: The New York Botanical Garden
Bronx
Park, New York, 10458
PALEOBOTANICAL
SECTION:
Chairman
(1969) : Arthur Cridland
Department
of Botany Washington State University Pullman. Washington, 99163
Secretary-Treasurer
(1969) : *John W. Hall
Department
of Botany University of Minnesota Minneapolis, Minnesota,
55455
PHYCOLOGICAL
SECTION:
Secretary
(1969) : *Philip Cook
Department
of Botany University of Vermont Burlington, Vermont, 05401
PHYSIOLOGICAL
SECTION:
Secretary
(1969) : Graeme P. Berlyn School of Forestry
Yale
University
New
Haven, Connecticut, 06511
PHYTOCHEMICAL
SECTION:
Chairman
(1969) : *Tom J. Mabry Department of Botany The University
of Texas Austin, Texas, 78712
Vice-Chairman
(1969): Rainer W. Scora
Dept.
of Horticultural Science
University
of California Riverside, California, 92502
Secretary
(1969) : Jerry McClure Department of Botany Miami University
Oxford,
Ohio, 45056
SYSTEMATIC
SECTION:
Chairman
(1969) : *Roy L. Taylor
Director
of the Botanical Gardens
University
of British Columbia
Vancouver
8, British Columbia. Canada
Secretary
(1969): L. I. Nevling
Arnold
Arboretum &
Gray
Herbarium
22
Divinity Avenue Cambridge, Masschusetts. 02138
TEACHING
SECTION:
Chairman
(1969-70 ) : J. Louis Martens Department of Biology Illinois
State University Normal, Illinois, 61761
Vice-Chairman
(1969-70) : O. J. Eigsti
Illinois
Teachers College Chicago South
3800
So. Stewart Avenue Chicago, Illinois, 60621
Secretary
(1969-70) : "Irving W. Knobloch Dept. of Botany &
Plant
Pathology Michigan State University East Lansing, Michigan,
48823
NORTHEASTERN
SECTION:
Chairman
(1969) : "Leon I. Cohen
Department
of Biology
State
University of New York
Cortland,
New York, 13045
Secretary-Treasurer
(1968-71) : Robert K. Zuck
Department
of Botany Drew University
Madison,
New Jersey, 07940
PACIFIC
SECTION:
Chairman
(1969) : Arthur Holmgren Department of Botany Utah State
University Logan, Utah, 84321
Secretary-Treasurer
(1969) : "Elizabeth Cutter Department of Botany University
of California Davis, California, 95616
SOUTHEASTERN
SECTION:
Chairman
(1968-69) : James W. Hardin Department of Botany North Carolina
State
University
Raleigh,
North Carolina, 27607
Secretary-Treasurer
(1967-70): *Dorothy L. Crandall Department of Biology Randolph-Macon Woman's
College
Lynchburg,
Virginia, 24504
*
(Those persons so marked with an (* ) are members of the Council. The Council
also includes the Officers of the Society except those elected to the Editorial
Committee.)
Book
Reviews
HULTEN,
ERIC. Flora of Alaska and Neighboring Terri-
tories.
A Manual of the Vascular Plants. Stanford
University
Press, Stanford, California. 1968. 1008
pages.
$35.00.
The
dean of arctic floristicians and phytogeographers has produced in this incredible
volume a lavish encore to his earlier oracle, "Flora of Alaska and Yukon"
(1940-49). The new flora is a diagnostic manual designed for a larger public
than the previous research flora, and as such it is more compact and includes
keys to the families and genera as well as to the species. The more complete
keys will please all users who have ever found themselves stymied
12
in
the older work by the absence of keys to the genera. But, alas!, the size
and the price are hardly calculated to make it either a field manual or a
layman's handbook. It is likely to remain in the laboratory or herbarium,
where, however, it will be indispensable to the student of Alaskan plants
and, especially by virtue of the maps, to all arctic botanists. This is not
only a model flora, incorporating an extraordinary amount of personal experience
and insight, but also another of the outstanding contributions to arctic geobotany
for which Professor Hultēn is so famous. No other living botanist is
as con-versant on the arctic and boreal plants of the entire circumpolar realm
from North America to Asia to Europe to Greenland. It would be hard to exaggerate
the practical and theoretical influence of his studies on floristicians and
phytogeographers. In this new volume we are presented with almost a lifetime
of thoughts on the Alaskan flora, distilled into a fresh descriptive conspectus
that succinctly reveals his taxonomic concepts.
The
spacious page format sparkles with clarity. On the average, two species are
treated per page, and the treatments are always contained on the same page,
so that one need not turn elsewhere for a map or an illustration. Unfortunately,
this very pleasing layout also wastes much space that could have been traded
off for less bulk, making the book truly a field manual. Each species is featured
with a short description, a line drawing or two, and two maps. Distribution
in the territory of the Flora is shown in a dot map, and the other map depicts
the circumpolar range in outline. The description may include a general habitat
characterization. Discussion of biology, taxonomy, or nomenclature is kept
to an absolute minimum; the book is purely an identification manual. Taxonomic
and nomenclatural changes are presented in an earlier paper (Arkiv for Botanik
7: 1-147, 1967), where Professor Hultēn can prove a little hard to convince
with detailed biosystematic evidence. Thus, thorough investigations like that
of Argus on the Salix glauca complex are waved aside, and one has the impression
that sometimes Hultēn is trapped by his own fruitful but seemingly a
priori historical arguments. To those who find him subspecies-happy it should
be pointed out that he has provided taxonomists with a dynamic, geographical
point of view that serves to set up numerous hypotheses for intensive investigation
by others. Above all, Hultēns new Flora will help enormously to stabilize
the names of arctic plants. He has picked his way through prolific Russian
splitting to emerge as before with a moderate species concept.
The
book includes a valuable introduction, covering ecological, geographical,
and historical aspects of the flora, and closes with an extensive glossary,
list of authors, and bibliography. The middle of the book is graced by eight
pages of spectacular color photographs of plants and places. The book is a
triumph by any standards and certainly a new milestone in the floristic literature
of North America. The Stanford University Press is to be congratulated for
its technical production, and special mention is due Dr. John Hunter Thomas
for editorial work.
Stanwyn
G. Sheller HEWITT, E. J. AND C. V. CUTTING, editors. Recent As-
pects
of Nitrogen Metabolism in Plants. (First Long
Ashton
Symposium, 1967) Academic Press, New York.
1968.
280 pages. $11.50.
This
selection of papers is the outcome of a symposium
held at the University of Bristol in April, 1967. All of
the 88 participants were from the British Isles. The 14
papers were presented in three sections: "Transformations
in inorganic nitrogen metabolism and fixation"—E. W.
Yemm, Chairman; `Intermediate metabolism of amino
acids and relationships with mineral nutrition and protein
synthesis"—F. R. Whatley, Chairman; and "Interaction of
nitrogen metabolism with external factors"—O. V. S.
Heath, Chairman. Discussions were held following each
section, and E. W. Yemm gave an excellent summary at
the close of the symposium, especially directed toward the
importance of respiratory and photosynthetic processes in
nitrate assimilation and in biosynthesis of amino acids
and proteins. Although there is a slight unevenness in the
papers in topicality and depth of treatment, the overall
quality is excellent. The "recent" denotation in the title
is a valid measure of the references of which the great
majority were published within the past four or five years.
Howard E. Brewer
REINHOLD,
L. AND Y. LIWSCHITZ, editors. Progress in Phytochemistry, Volume 1. Interscience
Publishers, New York, 1968. 723 pages. $23.75.
This
volume contains eleven chapters entitled as follows: Acyl Lipids and Fatty
Acids of Photosynthetic Tissue; Chemistry of Plant Cuticles; Relationship
between Plant Growth Hormones and Nucleic Acid Metabolism; Recent Advances
in the Chemistry of the Tetracyclic Diterpenes; Biosynthesis of the Gibberellins;
Lichen Substances; Biochemistry and Physiology of Phytochrome; Biochemistry
and Postulated Mechanisms of Nitrogen Fixation; The Tropane Alkaloids; Biochemical
Systematics; Constituents of Ferns.
Each
chapter, authored by an expert (s) in the field, admirably conforms to the
two-fold intention of the series, to wit: (1) to present sufficient background
in-formation to give the non-expert a comprehensive view of the subject matter;
(2) to provide the expert with recent advances in the field.
Several
of the chapters will be of great utility to the
plant physiologist, since their counterparts do not exist
elsewhere. This reviewer, for one, is looking forward
with great anticipation to future volumes in this series.
Joseph Scheibe
DARLINGTON,
ARNOLD. The Pocket Encyclopaedia of Plant Galls in Colour. Philosophical Library,
New York. 1968. 191 pages. $7.50.
Three
short introductory chapters, entitled, "Galls: Their Cause and Variety," "Gall
Occupants and How they Live," and "Practical Work," occupy only 30 pages.
On the next 80 pages are 293 excellent colored illustrations of galls and
the main types of animals that colonize them. A few fungus-induced galls are
also shown. The remaining pages of the text provide an annotated listing of
representative British host plants and their galls, followed by an index to
common and scientific names of gall occupants and host plants. Adolph
Hecht
|