Tag: mobot

The Missouri Botanical Garden’s Herbarium goes digital to revolutionize species identification (Links to an external site)

The Revolutionizing Species Identification (RSI) project at the Missouri Botanical Garden uses advanced AI technology to digitize its vast herbarium collection, creating a global reference library for rapid plant species identification. This online platform will enable scientists to upload data from unidentified plants for automated identification, accelerating restoration and conservation efforts worldwide. Additionally, the project provides training in plant taxonomy and herbarium creation, cultivating the next generation of botanical experts.

Climate change is super-charging St. Louis wildflowers (Links to an external site)

The wildflowers that bring a burst of color to meadows and forests across St. Louis are blooming later and longer than they did in previous decades, according to a study led by researchers with the Living Earth Collaborative, a signature initiative of the Arts & Sciences Strategic Plan. The study by Missouri Botanical Garden’s Matthew Austin and Ken Olsen, the George William and Irene Koechig Freiberg Professor of Biology is published in New Phytologist.

Missouri Botanical Garden names first woman president (Links to an external site)

Missouri Botanical Garden has named international botanist and conservationist Dr. Lúcia G. Lohmann as the Garden’s next President and Director and George Engelmann Professor of Botany at Washington University in St. Louis. Lohmann will be the eighth president of the Garden and the first woman to hold the position.

Understanding the role of soil microbial communities in oak woodland restoration using DNA metabarcoding (Links to an external site)

Soil microbial communities play a crucial role in oak woodland restoration, influencing the success of conservative herbaceous species reintroductions. Using DNA metabarcoding, researchers at Missouri Botanical Garden’s Shaw Nature Reserve studied how different restoration ages affect soil microbial composition and plant growth. Their findings suggest that younger restorations may offer more beneficial microbial conditions for conservative plant species, potentially improving nutrient uptake and stress resistance.

Small flowers focus of big climate research at Missouri Botanical Garden (Links to an external site)

The Missouri Botanical Garden is known for its beautiful plants and flowers, but that’s not where you’ll find ecologist Matthew Austin.

Most days, you’ll find the post-doctoral fellow with Washington University’s Living Earth Collaborative combing the stacks, not of a library, but of the garden’s Herbarium, one of the world’s best research resources for all things plants.

Bunkered ex situ plant conservation and páramo biodiversity farms (Links to an external site)

The “páramo biodiversity farms” initiative in Colombia’s Sumapaz region represents an innovative approach to biodiversity conservation, emphasizing the creation of ex situ living collections of threatened plants like Espeletia. These collections serve as tools for research, education, and ecological restoration while fostering collaboration with local communities. By prioritizing sustainable, community-driven conservation efforts, the initiative challenges traditional “ark paradigm” approaches and promotes biodiversity management rooted in the ecosystems and populations most affected.

In search of refuge (Links to an external site)

Two building and cars sit next to a forest in fall

With funding support from LEC, researchers look at whether Ozark oases at Tyson Research Center — climate change refugia — could help species persist in spite of rising temperatures.

Yes, spring flowers are blooming earlier. It might confuse bees. (Links to an external site)

“Climate change is altering when plants are blooming, and it’s disrupting the historic relationships between plants and their pollinators,” said Matthew Austin, an ecologist and biodiversity postdoctoral fellow with the Living Earth Collaborative at Washington University in St. Louis. “But we know remarkably little about what effect that has on how plants interact with one another and the evolutionary consequences of altered plant-plant interactions.”

Peter Raven autobiography just released!

Older white man wearing a hat and smiling at the camera in front of green hills

Peter H. Raven, George Engelmann Professor Emeritus of Botany at Washington University and Missouri Botanical Garden President Emeritus, has released Driven by Nature, his newly released autobiography that takes readers across multiple continents and decades.

Spotlight on Science: Adam Smith (Links to an external site)

Adam Smith, Assistant Scientist at the Missouri Botanical Garden’s Center for Conservation and Sustainable Development, uses models to predict how climate change will reshape ecosystems. His work has uncovered startling projections, like rare plants shifting thousands of miles or Madagascar’s forests vanishing entirely by 2080. By integrating past and future climate data, Smith’s research helps guide conservation efforts, including seed banking and habitat preservation, while exploring innovative topics like urban expansion driven by self-driving cars and the importance of microrefugia for biodiversity resilience.

Stop and Smell the Anthuriums (Links to an external site)

Monica Carlsen is one of the Missouri Botanical Garden’s aroid experts, who specializes in Anthurium research. Through a grant from the Living Earth Collaborative, she is investigating the role scents play in plant/pollinator interactions in Anthurium.

Seeding St. Louis (Links to an external site)

For 160 years, the Missouri Botanical Garden has been committed to the growth of St. Louis. Each generation has cultivated the seeds planted by those who came before to advance our mission across the region and beyond. In this season of gratitude and thanksgiving, Vice President of Education Sheila Voss reflects on the role the Garden plays in our community today.

To plant or not to plant?* (Links to an external site)

What we think we know about how to restore tropical forests is getting a second look. A new paper produced by scientists in Missouri Botanical Garden’s Center for Conservation and Sustainable Development (CCSD), the University of Hawaii’s Lyon Arboretum, and the University of Maryland Baltimore County points out an important bias in recent studies.

International research powerhouses join forces to advance study of life on Earth (Links to an external site)

Washington University in St. Louis is creating the Living Earth Collaborative to be led by Jonathan Losos. In establishing the collaborative, the university is joining forces with two of the nation’s leading institutions in the study and preservation of plants and animals — the Missouri Botanical Garden and the Saint Louis Zoo — to create a new academic center dedicated to advancing the study of biodiversity to help ensure the future of Earth’s species in their many forms.