Officers & Council of the
Systematics Association

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Officers

President
Professor R. Bateman Jodrell Laboratory Royal Botanic Gardens Kew, Richmond Surrey TW9 3DS	Richard's research interests are integrating morphological (including palaeobotanical) and molecular data to study major transitions in land-plant evolution at all spatial scales. His favourite study groups are living orchids and fossil clubmosses and gymnosperms, and his pet evolutionary hypothesis is the potential for instant, radical shifts in phenotype (i.e. saltation). He is currently Vice-President of both the Linnean Society and the Botanical Society of the British Isles, President of the UK Hardy Orchid Society, and part-time Head of Policy at the Biosciences Federation. He also holds a Visiting Professorship at Reading University.
Secretary
Dr. Z. Griffiths (nee Lawrence) CABI Bioscience UK Centre (Egham) Bakeham Lane Egham Surrey TW20 9TY	Zofia is a world expert on the systematics and ecology of the fungal genera Penicillium and Aspergillus, and has a particular interest in their roles as food spoilage organisms. In this capacity she has, since 1987, acted as the United Kingdom representative on The International Commission for Penicillium and Aspergillus Systematics, and The International Working Committee for Stored Product Protection. She is a visiting lecturer at the University of Minho, Portugal and the Institute of Science and Food Protection (ISPA), Italy. Although retired, she still publishes and remains active in both her research field and the wider interests and promotion of systematics.
Meetings Secretary
Dr. W. Baker Herbarium Royal Botanic Gardens Kew, Richmond Surrey TW9 3AS	Bill is head of palm research at Kew. His research interests range from the taxonomy of Old World palms to tackling broader evolutionary questions across the palm family. An active fieldworker, Bill is currently focusing on palms in the Asia-Pacific region, especially New Guinea and Lord Howe Island, and Madagascar. He is a Research Associate of Fairchild Tropical Botanic Garden in Miami, Florida, and also sits on committees in the Linnean Society and the Royal Horticultural Society.
Grants & Awards Secretary
Dr. J.A. Hawkins School of Biological Sciences The University of Reading Whiteknights Reading RG6 6AS	Julie has been teaching and researching at the University of Reading since 1998. Principally interested in the systematics of flowering plants, particularly Fabales, and in systematic theory, she has published across abroad range of systematic areas - from homology assessment to the evolution of floras. More recently she has developed a research programme which exploits molecular marker data to determine identity, parentage and provenance of economically important plants in trade.
Membership Secretary
Dr. G. Reid Department of Botany The Natural History Museum Cromwell Road London SW7 5BD	This Council member has not yet supplied a biography.
Treasurer
Dr. C.E. Hughes Dept. Plant Sciences University of Oxford South Parks Rd Oxford OX1 3RB	Colin holds a Royal Society University Research Fellowship in systematic botany. His research interests are in taxonomic monography and phylogenetics of plant species. He is particularly interested in species-level problems, including species delimitation and classification, species-level phylogenetics, interspecific hybridization, geographical patterns of species diversification and species radiations, and early domestication of crop plants. He works mainly on Neotropical legumes, with current projects on the genera Leucaena, Lupinus and Mimosa.
Editor in Chief
Dr. A. Warren Department of Zoology The Natural History Museum Cromwell Road London SW7 5BD	Alan's research interests are the morphology, taxonomy and ecology of ciliated protozoa. He is currently focusing on marine ciliates in northern China, their diversity and use as bioindicators of water quality, and on the development of an interactive guide to the identification of sewage ciliates.

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Council members co-opted for 2007

Dr J. Brodie Dept. of Botany The Natural History Museum Cromwell Rd London SW7 5BD	This Council member has not yet supplied a biography.
Webmaster
Mr R.G. Wilson Science & Learning Division Royal Horticultural Society Garden Wisley Woking Surrey GU23 6QB	After gaining his first degree in Botany from the University of Reading, Rupert remained in the Herbarium of the School of Plant Sciences for 13 years, where he developed his database skills, putting the Herbarium online. In 2001, he moved to the Royal Horticultural Society Garden at Wisley, where he took over running the RHS Horticultural Database, expanding his role in 2005 to cover management of all horticultural data within the Science and Learning division of the RHS. Rupert maintains a keen interest in evolving technologies and their possible applications in botany and horticulture.
Dr. L. Rüber Dept. of Zoology The Natural History Museum Cromwell Rd London SW7 5BD	Lukas' research is motivated by a keen interest in the astonishing diversity of ray-fined fishes and the patterns of diversity and the evolutionary processes generating it. He is particularly interested in the application of genetic and geometric morphometric data to study the evolution of ecological and phenotypic diversity within species rich lineages. Additional research interests include: biogeography, comparative methods applied to life-history evolution, ancestral character state reconstruction, and relaxed molecular clock methods. His current research focuses on Southeast Asian freshwater fish diversity, marine adaptive radiations, and speciation in Lake Tanganyika cichlids.

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Council members retiring in 2007

Dr M. van der Giezen School of Biological Sciences Queen Mary College University of London Mile End Rd London E1 4NS	Mark's primary research interest is the evolution of early microbial eukaryotes and their mitochondria. The origin of eukaryotes appears closely linked to that of the mitochondrion (or its anaerobic sister, the hydrogenosome), and by studying the diversity of mitochondria in various microbial eukaryotes he hopes to shed light on some key early events in eukaryote evolution.
Dr P. Hollingsworth Royal Botanic Gardens 20A Inverleith Row Edinburgh EH3 5LR	This Council member has not yet supplied a biography.
Professor C.J. Humphries Dept. of Botany The Natural History Museum Cromwell Rd London SW7 5BD	This Council member has not yet supplied a biography.
Dr R. de Kok Herbarium, Royal Botanic Gardens Kew, Richmond Surrey TW9 3AE	This Council member has not yet supplied a biography.
Dr V. Savolainen Herbarium, Royal Botanic Gardens Kew, Richmond Surrey TW9 3AS	Vincent is Reader in Ecology & Evolutionary Biology at Imperial College London and the Royal Botanic Gardens Kew. He coordinates the European Research Training network on 'understanding and conserving the earth's biodiversity hotspots' (HOTSPOTS), and several individual-driven EU Marie Curie postdoctoral projects on co-evolution, speciation, evolutionary radiations, biodiversity patterns and climate change. He leads two projects funded by the Darwin Initiative for the Survival of Species in Southern Africa and Central America. His additional research interests include: angiosperm phylogeny; Tree of Life; evolutionary processes and phylogenetic patterns; evolutionary rates; speciation; pollination biology and biological interactions; evolutionary developmental biology; DNA barcoding; conservation.

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Council members retiring in 2008

Dr J. Bennett St Paul's School Lonsdale Road London SW13 9JT	Jon is currently a member of the biology department at St. Paul's School, London (www.stpaulsschool.org.uk). Before moving into teaching he worked as a post-doc on various research projects including a worldwide monograph of the large genus Solanum (www.nhm.ac.uk/solanaceaesource) at the Natural History Museum, London and an investigation of the evolution of photoreceptors in the parasitic plant family Orobanchaceae in the lab of Dr Sarah Mathews, Harvard University. His interest in the systematics of the Lamiales began during his PhD studies on the taxonomy of Strobilanthes (Acanthaceae) in Oxford. Jon still retains an interest in the taxonomy of Acanthaceae and is also the book review editor for the Linnean Society.
Dr R. Cowan Royal Botanic Gardens Kew, Richmond Surrey TW9 3AS	This Council member has not yet supplied a biography.
Dr S. Jansen Jodrell Laboratory Royal Botanic Gardens Kew, Richmond Surrey TW9 3AS	Steven's research activities focus on xylem evolution and structure-functional relationships of wood. While various wood anatomical diversity patterns reflect their phylogenetic significance, some of the variation can be explained as a result of ecological and functional adaptations, especially with respect to conductive efficiency, vulnerability to embolism, and mechanical strength. He also studies the taxonomic variation of mineral elements in plants.
Newsletter Editor
Dr R.A. Jenner Dept.of Biology & Biochemistry University of Bath Bath BA2 7AY	Ronald is currently a postdoctoral researcher working on the phylogeny of malacostracan crustaceans. However, his research interests range from the deep history of the Metazoa to conceptual and historical aspects of comparative biology. He is a regular essayist for the Palaeontological Association Newsletter.
Dr J. Richardson Royal Botanic Gardens 20A Inverleith Row Edinburgh EH3 5LR	James' primary interests are in the use of dated molecular phylogenies to reconstruct the history of tropical plant taxa. His research integrates the disciplines of phylogenetics, taxonomy, palaeobotany, geology and palaeoclimatology. He has also used similar approaches to investigate the age of elements of the South African Cape flora. He will also be using molecular and morphological data to determine generic limits in Sapotaceae, leading to detailed monographic studies. Other current studies focus on Inga (Leguminosae), and previous work has been undertaken on Annonaceae and Rhamnaceae.
Dr D. Roberts The Natural History Museum Cromwell Rd London SW7 5BD	Dave is a microbiologist who has worked on ciliate systematics, eukaryotes in extreme environments, general eukaryotic relationships and environmental sampling using molecular methods. Current research interests are focussed on environmental profiling, especially the detection of rare clones in environmental libraries and the general problem of discriminating species in microbes. The other major component of Dave's working life is the EU EDIT project, in which he leads Workpackage 6 (Unifying Revisionary Taxonomy). See www.editwebrevisions.info and www.nhm.ac.uk/research-curation/ projects/euk-extreme/

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Council members retiring in 2009

Dr P. Rudall Jodrell Laboratory Royal Botanic Gardens Kew, Richmond Surrey TW9 3DS	Paula uses empirical data from comparative morphology (including ontogeny, anatomy, embryology and pollen morphology) in a phylogenetic and developmental-genetic context, in particular to address hypotheses on the evolution of plant form and systematics of monocotyledons.
Newsletter Editor
Dr M. Ruta Dept. of Earth Sciences University of Bristol Wills Memorial Building Queen's Rd Bristol BS8 1RJ	Marcello's research interest cover primitive limbed vertebrates (tetrapods), especially Devonian to Permian groups, and Palaeozoic echinoderms (with emphasis on the chordate-like and problematic stylophorans). Major research themes include inter-relationships of major groups of Palaeozoic tetrapods, the assembly of characters along the stem-groups of amphibians and amniotes, the use of morphometrics to evaluate disparity, rates of character change, palaeobiogeography and the study of variance in selected morphofunctional systems (e.g. appendicular skeleton, lower jaw). He is currently a postdoctoral researcher involved in phylogenetic aspects of the Permo-Triassic mass extinction.
Dr R. Scotland Dept. of Plant Sciences Oxford University South Parks Rd Oxford OX1 3RB	This Council member has not yet supplied a biography.
Dr A. Vogler Imperial College University of London Prince Consort Rd London SW7 2AZ	Alfried is Professor of Molecular Systematics at Imperial College London and has a joint appointment with the Natural History Museum. His research interests are the molecular phylogenetics and evolutionary diversity of insects, in particular beetles (Coleoptera). He is developing new methods in DNA taxonomy, large-scale phylogenetics and phylogenomics of insects. He is co-director of two Masters courses at Imperial College/NHM (MRes Biosystematics and MSc Taxonomy and Biodiversity).
Dr D.M. Williams Dept. of Botany The Natural History Museum Cromwell Rd London SW7 5BD	This Council member has not yet supplied a biography.
Dr P. Olson Dept. of Zoology The Natural History Museum Cromwell Rd London SW7 5BD	Pete's research interests involve the evolution of the parasitic flatworms, and in particular the evolution of segmentation in the tapeworms. His approaches include descriptive and pattern-based studies employing morphological and molecular systematics and phylogenomics, as well as process-based studies including Hox gene expression and trans-splicing mechanisms of gene translation. He plays an active role at the NHM in helping to define best practices relating to collections intended to archive genetic biodiversity.

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Last updated: 9 May 2007
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