Dissertations / Theses on the topic 'Botany collecting'

It is well known that American botanist Asa Gray's 1859 paper on the floristic similarities between Japan and the United States was among the earliest applications of Charles Darwin's evolutionary theory in plant geography. Commonly known as Gray's "disjunction thesis," Gray's diagnosis of that previously inexplicable pattern not only provoked his famous debate with Louis Agassiz but also secured his role as the foremost advocate of Darwin and Darwinism in the United States. Making use of previously unknown archival materials, this dissertation examines the making of Gray's disjunction thesis and its relation to his collecting networks. I first point out that, as far back as the 1840s, Gray had identified remarkable "analogies" between the flora of East Asia and that of North America. By analyzing Gray and his contemporaries' "free and liberal exchange of specimens," I argue that Gray at the time was convinced that "a particular plan" existed in nature, and he considered that the floristic similarities between Japan and eastern North America manifested this plan. In the 1850s, when Gray applied himself to enumerating collections brought back by professional collectors supported by the subscription system and appointed in governmental surveying expeditions, his view of nature was then replaced by one that regarded the flora as merely "a catalogue of species." I argue that it was by undertaking the manual labor of cataloging species and by charging subscription fees for catalogued species that Gray established his status as a metropolitan botanist and as the "mint" that produced species as a currency for transactions in botanical communities. Finally, I examine the Gray-Darwin correspondence in the 1850s and the expedition that brought Gray's collector to Japan. I argue that Gray's thesis cannot be considered Darwinian as historians of science have long understood the term, and that its conception was part of the United States' scientific imperialism in East Asia. In light of recent studies focusing on the history of field sciences, this dissertation urges that a close examination of a biogeographical discovery like Gray's thesis is impossible without considering the institutional, cultural, and material aspects that tie the closets of naturalists to the field destinations of collectors.

With only three sources of resistance currently known to race 6 of Pseudomonas syringae pv. phaseolicola (Burkholder) (Psp) which causes halo blight, an important bacterial disease of common bean, there is an urgent need to identify additional sources of resistance. Therefore, 283 accessions of common bean from the USDA-NPGS core collection were evaluated for resistance to race 6 of Psp under greenhouse conditions. Using unifoliate leaf inoculation method, a total of 13% of accessions were resistant. Five of these accessions, PI 201329, PI 309810, PI 310826, PI 319592, and PI 533259, displayed the highest levels of resistance with mean halo blight score of 1.1. Unifoliate vs trifoliate inoculation methods were also evaluated. Significantly higher mean (4.0) and range (1.0-7.0) of halo blight severity was observed at trifoliate stage compared to unifoliate stage, 2.0 and 1.0-2.4, respectively. A significant positive but weak correlation (r2=0.17) of halo blight severity between trifoliate and pod inoculation methods within an individual plant suggests that disease resistance may be controlled by independent genes prevalent at each plant developmental stage. Halo blight severity observed in trifoliate leaves and pods under greenhouse condition was later validated under field condition. Significantly higher mean disease score and range of 4.7 and 2.3-7.1 were reported at pod stage compared to 3.6 and 2.0-6.6, respectively, at trifoliate stage. However, PI 313217 showed consistent resistant reaction across all plant development stages, i.e., unifoliate, trifoliate, and pod, under both field and greenhouse conditions. A significant but weak correlation (r2=0.21) between halo blight severity in trifoliate leaves and pods under field condition confirmed the greenhouse results. To identify genomic regions associated with resistance to race 6 of Psp, genome-wide association mapping study (GWAS) was employed using 197 accessions and 4707 single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP) markers. Three significant regions were identified, of which two novel regions in Pv04 and one in Pv05 controlled for 19% of the phenotypic variation. The significant SNPs could be used in marker assisted selection (MAS) for the improvement of common bean breeding program with focus on resistance to race 6 of Psp.
Northarvest Bean Growers Association
United States Department of Agriculture-National Plant Germplasm System (USDA-NPGS)
National Crop Germplasm Committee
Phaseolus Genetics Committee

Thanks to the Heritage Lottery Fund (HLF), museums are experiencing a longawaited redisplay renaissance in the early 21 st century. The thesis, prompted by the observed renaissance, explores and examines the factors and processes involved in the redevelopment of biological displays in British museums. Using a qualitative, grounded theory methodology and analytic process, the research focuses on three case study museums; Kelvingrove Art Gallery and Museum in Glasgow, the Great North Museum in Newcastle upon Tyne, and the Royal Albert Memorial Museum in Exeter. Informed by preliminary research, the main study employs the semi-structured interview method to collect primary data from key project team members. To triangulate findings from the interviews, and develop an overarching theory, complementary primary and secondary data was also collected in the form of project reports, meeting minutes, photographs, etc. The findings demonstrate that 'accepting change' in the museum is key to the redisplay of biological collections. The single most important change in these redevelopments has been the approach to the redisplay process; namely the shift from the curator-driven model to the team approach. This has, singlehandedly, transformed the key elements of the process; decision-making and communication, whilst introducing the important element, teamwork. By applying a team approach, powers of decision making are shared across team members and work progresses more rapidly. It also ensures that the final gallery incorporates the educational, design, conservation and curatorial aspects. The driving factors were also uncovered in the course of the research. Categorised as internal and external factors, some were more influential than others; the collections and project team members (internal) and the audience and funders (external) proved particularly influential in early stages of the three projects. The findings from this research contribute to the limited museological research into contemporary biological redisplays. It debates the shifting paradigms and new display processes in British museums, but future research could develop the grounded theory to investigate and test gallery redisplays worldwide.

This thesis explores the history of botany as a global collection-based science by tracing parallels between utopian traditions and botanical collecting, from their sixteenth-century beginnings to the present. A range of botanical collections, such as gardens, herbaria and classification systems, have played a central role in the struggle to discover a global or universal scientific order for the chaotic, diverse and locally shaped kingdom of plants. These collections and utopia intersect historically, and are characterised by the same epistemology of collecting: the creation of order through confined collecting spaces or “no-place.” They are manipulations of space and time. Between chaos and order, both seek to make a whole from – often unruly – parts.   The long history of botanical collecting is characterised by a degree of continuity of practice that is unusual in the sciences.  For instance, the basic technology of the herbarium – preserving plants by mounting and labelling dried specimens on paper – has been in use for almost five centuries, from sixteenth-century Italy to ongoing digitisation projects. The format of the compilation thesis is well-suited to handling the historiographical challenge of tracing continuity and discontinuity with such a long chronological scope.   The thesis is structured as a walled quadripartite garden, with the Kappa enclosing four research papers and an epilogue. The papers take a diachronic approach to explore different perspectives on botanical collections: botanical collecting in seventeenth-century Oxford, pressed plants in books that are not formally collections; and the digitisation of botanical collections. These accounts are all shaped by the world of books, text and publication, historically a male-dominated sphere. In order to acknowledge marginalisation of other groups and other ways of knowing plants, the epilogue is an explanation of an embroidered patchwork of plant-dyed fabric, which forms the cover of the thesis.
Denna avhandling behandlar historien om botanik som en global samlingsbaserad vetenskap genom att följa paralleller mellan utopiska traditioner och botaniskt samlande från dess början på femtonhundratalet till idag. Olika sorters botaniska samlingar, till exempel trädgårdar, herbarier och klassifikationssystem, har historiskt spelat en central roll i sökandet efter en global eller universell vetenskaplig ordning i växtrikets lokalt rotade och till synes kaotiska mångfald. Det finns historiska kopplingar mellan dessa botaniska samlingar och utopi, som båda även präglas av vad man kan kalla samlandets epistemologi: skapandet av ordning genom avgränsade samlingsutrymmen eller ”icke-platser”. De är manipulationer av tid och rum.   Det botaniska samlandets långa historia utmärks av en praktisk kontinuitet som är ovanlig inom naturvetenskapen. Herbariets grundläggande teknik att bevara växter genom att pressa, identifiera och montera dem på pappersark har varit i bruk i nästan fem sekel. Avhandlingen utnyttjar sammanläggningsformatet för att hantera den historiografiska utmaning det innebär att studera en så lång tidsperiod, genom att de ingående artiklarna behandlar skilda tidsepoker och disciplinära perspektiv samtidigt som de alla delar avhandlingens centrala tematik: ordnande genom avgränsade samlingsutrymmen.     Avhandlingens struktur är baserad på den muromgärdade fyrdelade trädgården, med kappan som inneslutande fyra artiklar och en epilog. Artiklarna är diakrona analyser av botaniska samlingar: om samlande i Oxford på sextonhundratalet, om pressade växter i böcker som inte formellt utgör del av samlingar, och om digitaliseringen av botaniska samlingar. Dessa sammanhang är alla formade i en värld av böcker, text och publicering – en värld som historiskt har dominerats av män. Epilogen belyser den marginalisering av andra grupper och deras kunskaper om växter som detta har inneburit, genom att förklara avhandlingens omslag, ett lapptäcksbroderi av växtfärgade tyger.

QC 20171115

Saving Nature: Conservation Technologies from the Biblical Ark to the Digital Archive

Bibliography: pages 71-83.
A variety of studies have shown the problems of energy supply faced by low-income communities in southern Africa. Most of these communities are dependent upon indigenous fuelwood supplies. In addition, many of these communities use indigenous wood for construction. This largely uncontrolled utilisation imposes severe threats on woody vegetation communities. The Eastern Cape/Ciskei region is an area where energy supply problems are particularly severe and impacts on woody vegetation correspondingly severe. This study aimed to investigate the feasibility of using remote sensing techniques to monitor the the impact caused by collection of wood in the Eastern Cape/Ciskei forest and thicket communities. A variety of remote sensing techniques for landcover analysis were investigated. In all cases, visual interpretation was used because it is considerably cheaper and demands less technical expertise than would computer processing. In addition, many studies have shown visual interpretation to be superior. Maps were drawn from multitemporal aerial photograph sequences and from Landsat and SPOT satellite images. These maps showed that there has been relatively little change in area of woody vegetation in the study area since 1956. However, field studies showed that vegetation community structure had been degraded as a result of intense and sustained human impact. This qualitative decline also reflected a decline in usefulness of the woody vegetation of the area to local communities. This substantial degradation was not visible on any of the remote sensing imageries. This emphasises that field-based checks to monitor human impacts on forest and thicket formations are essential. Strategies for reducing the dependence of low-income communities on indigenous vegetation for energy supplies and constructional timber have been reviewed from the literature and these are descibed in Appendix 1. Most successful strategies in other parts of the world have been the result of a national commitment to tree planting, recognition of a multiplicity of constraints and the voluntary involvement of the communities the strategies are intended to assist.

Allocation of assimilated carbon amongst plant metabolic processes and tissues is important to understanding ecosystem carbon cycles. Due to the range of spatio-temporal scales and complex process interactions involved, direct measurements of allocation in natural environments are logistically difficult. Modeling approaches provide tools to examine these patterns by integrating finer scale process measurements. One such method is root:shoot balance, where plant growth is limited by either shoot activity (i.e. photosynthesis) or root activity (i.e. water and nutrient uptake). This method shows promise for application on frequently disturbed systems which perturb aboveground biomass and thus create imbalances in root and shoot activities. In this study, root:shoot balance, allometric relationships and phenological patterns were used to model carbon allocation and growth in Florida scrub oaks. The model was tested using ecosystem gas exchange (i.e. eddy covariance) and meteorological data from two independent sites at Merritt Island National Wildlife Refuge, FL which experienced two different types of disturbance events: a prescribed burn in 2006 and wind damage from Hurricane Frances in 2004. The effects of the two disturbance events, which differed greatly in magnitude and impact, were compared to identify similarities and differences in plant allocation response. Model results and process-based sensitivity analysis demonstrated the strong influence of autotrophic respiration on plant growth and allocation processes. Also, fine root dynamics were found to dominate partitioning trends of carbon allocated to growth. Overall, model results aligned well with observed biomass trends, with some discrepancies that suggest fine root turnover to be more dynamic than currently parameterized in the model.; This modeling approach can be extended through the integration with more robust process models, for example, mechanistic photosynthesis, nitrogen uptake and/or dynamic root turnover models.
ID: 029810098; System requirements: World Wide Web browser and PDF reader.; Mode of access: World Wide Web.; Thesis (M.S.)--University of Central Florida, 2011.; Includes bibliographical references (p. 66-73).
M.S.
Masters
Biology
Sciences

Créé à la fin du XVIIIe siècle par la East India Company, le jardin botanique de Calcutta devint un centre d’acclimatation et de classification d’espèces végétales et connut un âge d’or pendant le dernier tiers du XIXe siècle . Financé par l’empire britannique, alors à son apogée, dont Calcutta demeura la capitale en Inde jusqu’en 1911, le jardin contribuait à la fois économiquement et symboliquement au dispositif impérial. La thèse examine conjointement ces deux dimensions, ce que l’historiographie n’a pas fait jusqu’à présent. En même temps qu’il servait les capitalistes britanniques en favorisant l’exploitation agricole des terres colonisées, le jardin incarnait un discours historique selon lequel la colonisation était une entreprise civilisatrice. Son espace sémiotiquement dense mettait en scène la maîtrise coloniale de la nature. Les plantes, spécimens et publications qu’il produisait alimentaient le fonctionnement à la fois matériel et discursif d’un pouvoir qui se disait mondial, fécond et scientifique. Les histoires du jardin issues de la sphère coloniale ont donc logiquement insisté sur son rôle dans la dissémination de nouvelles espèces en Inde, échafaudant un paradigme de l’introduction botanique qui a souvent été repris de manière non critique dans l’historiographie. Cette thèse propose précisément de faire un sort à l’idéologie historique portée par ce jardin en en examinant l’envers, les contradictions et les absurdités. Tout comme l’empire qu’il servait et représentait, le jardin était profondément dysfonctionnel. À partir de sources variées, j’élabore une histoire spatiale, matérielle et sociale de cette institution qui permet d’ouvrir de nouvelles perspectives sur le fait impérial en Inde à la fin du XIXe siècle
Established at the end of the eighteenth century by the East India Company, the Calcutta botanic garden became a centre for the acclimatization and classification of plants. The garden was funded by the imperial government and the last three decades of the nineteenth century, when the Raj reached its apex, represented its golden age. Situated in Calcutta, which remained the capital of British India until 1911, the garden contributed both economically and symbolically to the imperial system. This thesis chooses to consider these two aspects together, contrary to garden histories that have generally separated them. While the garden directly served British capitalists by contributing to the agricultural exploitation of colonized lands, it also embodied a historical discourse according to which colonization was a civilizing entreprise. Its semiotically dense space displayed the colonial control over nature. The plants, specimens and publications that it produced played, by word and deed, into the hands of a power that represented itself as global, productive and scientific. Histories of the garden produced within the colonial sphere have therefore insisted on the part it played in the dissemination of new species in India. By doing so, these histories have created a paradigm of botanical introduction that was often taken for granted in the subsequent historical production about the garden. This thesis chooses precisely to study the historical ideology that the garden embodied and sustained, a careful study of which shows that it was full of contradictions, failures and absurdities. Both the garden and the empire that it served were deeply dysfunctional. Based on a great variety of sources, this thesis presents a spatial, material and social history of the garden which sheds new light on the nature of imperialism in India at the end of the nineteenth century

Tese de doutoramento em Biologia (Sistemática e Morfologia) apresentada a Fac. de Ciências e Tecnologia de Coimbra
As actuais circunstâncias económicas e sociais conduzem o conhecimento de matriz etnobotânica a um inexorável processo de extinção, porque são os cidadãos mais idosos os seus depositários. Com a sua eventual perda, associada ao fim das práticas agrícolas tradicionais, desaparecerão informações protocientíficas acumuladas ao longo de séculos. O objectivo primordial deste estudo foi o de valorizar esses conhecimentos e contribuir para a sua conservação, dentro de uma estratégia ecológica de gestão dos recursos naturais. O estudo foi desenvolvido com comunidades rurais do Concelho de Beja durante três anos (2003-2005). Realizaram-se entrevistas a 54 informantes, maioritariamente mulheres, com idades superiores a 60 anos, e registaram-se os conhecimentos etnobotânicos vivos e de memória viva. A informação recolhida, apresenta-se de acordo com o modelo enunciado no Economic Botany Data Collection Standard (Cook, 1995) e está distribuída por treze classes de uso. Registaram-se 1032 usos específicos, referentes a 166 espécies, 125 géneros e 53 famílias. A classe de uso com maior número de citações foi a classe 11 (usos medicinais), com 471 usos. Os resultados indicaram-nos que 58% das plantas estudadas possui entre 1 e 5 usos específicos. As espécies com maior valor social, aquelas que os informantes identificaram culturalmente com a sua região, foram: Coriandrum sativum, Cynara cardunculus, Mentha pulegium, Olea europaea, Quercus rotundifolia, Quercus suber, Triticum aestivum, Triticum turgidum e Vitis vinifera. O índice de etnobotanicidade foi 25%; quando consideradas apenas as plantas medicinais foi 16%.
In the modern world, ethnobotanical knowledge is on the edge of extinction because only old people living in rural areas use it. Its eventual loss, bounded with the end of traditional farms, will erase proto-scientific information gathered over hundreds of years. The main purpose of this work was to increase awareness to this issue and at the same time record the knowledge for future use within a new, rational and ecological management of our natural resources. The study was made in the rural communities of Beja county for three years (2003-2005). We made semi-structured and informal interviews to 54 informants, mainly women, age over 60 years old, and we recorded the living and the living memory knowledge. The information was recorded following the Economic Botany Data Collection Standard (Cook, 1995) and it is clustered in thirteen levels of use. We recorded 1032 uses from 166 plant species and 125 genera included in 53 families. The level with the highest number of citations was Level 11 (medicinal) - 471 uses recorded. The results show that 58% of the plants have between 1 to 5 specific uses. The species with the highest social value, those which the informants used to define their cultural heritage, were: Coriandrum sativum, Cynara cardunculus, Mentha pulegium, Olea europaea, Quercus rotundifolia, Quercus suber, Triticum aestivum, Triticum turgidum, and Vitis vinifera. The ethnobotanical index was 25% and the ethnobotanical index concerning medicinal plants only was 16%.

The Douglas Summerland Collection is a fictional "monographically based history"1. In essence this research is concerned with the current debates about history recording, authenticity of the photograph, methods of history construction and how the audience digests new 'knowledge'. The narrative for this body of work is drawn from a small album of maritime photographs discovered in 2004 within the archives of the Port Chalmers Regional Maritime Museum in New Zealand. The album contains vernacular images of life onboard several sailing ships from the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, including the DH Sterling and the William Mitchell. Through investigating the'truth' systems promoted by the photograph within the presentations of histories this research draws a link between the development of colonialism and the perception of photography. It also deliberates on how 'truth' perception is still a major part of an audience's knowledge base. 1. Anne-Marie Willis Picturing Australia: A History of Photography, Angus & Robertson Publishers, London. 1988:253

碩士
逢甲大學
土地管理學系
107
On the advertisements of daily newspaper, magazines and websites, it is often to find that high greening and views from the environment and landscape within the residential areas proposed by real estate companies. High quality collective mansions usually are equipped with conditions, including: low site coverage ratio, low floor area ratio, low building density and high greening coverage ratio, which are named “three lows and one high” characteristics. From the perspectives of architural development and residential demands, they are looking for both higher efficiency uses of resources and meanwhile more friendly treatment toward the environment. Therefore, the policy of “yield green to the residential community” only for residents within the community to enjoy is the mainstream idea in Taichung City. The motivation of this study was focused on the best efficacy of real estate developers and consumers to reach both price and values maximization from the viewpoint of the importance of botanical greening and landscape to the high quality collective mansions. The purpose of this study was to explore the influences of botanical greening landscape on the prices of the high quality collective mansions and to provide the values of references for real estate investors, housing consumers as well as researchers of this concern. In terms of study methodology, literature of the effects of botanical green landscape on housing prices and relevant issues was reviewed to assure the study framework. By considering that general housing consumers and first time housing buyers may not be easy to understand this study topic, experts such as: bosses of building companies, real estate dealers, brokers, agents and realestate praisers, were interviewed to gather the data for the base of the study analyses. The findings of this study included: (1) the opinions of both experts and consumers in their eyes were quite similar towards the study topic, yet a few differences were still remained; (2) consumers in experts’ eyes were quite similar in their behaviors of greening landscape housing purchasing decisions analysis but the policy factor was less affected; (3) the characteristics of the high quality mansions need to be considered not only unit price, numbers of area units and total price of the housing unit, but also nearby environment and living environment within the mansions; and (4) the analyses of both the good and the bad influences of the botanical greening landscape on housings prices were presented. According to the study results, some suggestions were presented for the references of real estate developers, investors, land owners, housing buyers as well as following researchers for the concerns of how botanical greening landscape affect the housing prices in high quality collective mansions.

Postharvest stem bending is one of the most detrimental factors that affect postharvest quality life of Gerbera jamesonii cutflower varieties. Stem bending is of economic importance in the cutflower industry in South Africa because it negatively affects the overall total sales. Growers and retailers want to improve the postharvest vaselife of this crop using suitable preservatives. The aim of this study was to determine suitable preservatives and optimal vaselife conditions that could prevent or minimise postharvest stem bending of Gerbera jamesonii “Black diamond”. The variety “Black diamond was selected and treated with four different floral preservative solutions. The relationship between stem bending and absorption rate of the preservative solutions was established. The data gathered indicated that there was a significant difference to the solution absorption rate and stem bending. Stem bending differed from 0 to 38 degrees. Stems treated on control, preservative 3 and 4 recorded the highest degrees of bending, while preservative 1 and 2 recorded the lowest degrees of stem bending within 12 day period. The performance results of the preservatives and control repeated three times under the same experimental conditions showed that preservative 1 and 2 can be used to minimise postharvest stem bending of Gerbera jamesonii ‘Black diamond’
College of Agriculture and Environmental Sciences
M. Sc. (Ornamental Horticulture)