Botanical Society of America
{{Short description|US learned scientific organization for plants}}
{{Use mdy dates|date=January 2025}}
{{Infobox organization
| name = Botanical Society of America
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| abbreviation = BSA
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| formation = 1893
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| type = Non-profit
NGO
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| purpose = "Promote botany, the field of basic science dealing with the study and inquiry into the form, function, development, diversity, reproduction, evolution, and uses of plants and their interactions within the biosphere."{{cite web |url=http://www.botany.org/about_bsa/ |title=Botanical Society of America – About the BSA |publisher=Botany.org |access-date=2012-09-17 |archive-date=2016-06-15 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160615010638/http://www.botany.org/about_bsa/ |url-status=dead }}
| headquarters = St. Louis, Missouri, United States
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| leader_title = President
| leader_name = Andrea Wolfe (2017–2020)
| leader_title2 = President Elect|
| leader_name2 = Linda Watson (2018–2021)
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| website = {{URL|http://www.botany.org/}}
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The Botanical Society of America (BSA) represents professional and amateur botanists, researchers, educators and students in over 80 countries of the world. It functions as a United States nonprofit 501(c)(3) membership society.{{Cite web|url=https://www.botany.org/|title=Home|website=www.botany.org|accessdate=2024-10-28}}
History
The society was first established in 1893 as an outgrowth from the Botanical Club of the American Association for the Advancement of Science at a meeting in Rochester, New York, on August 22, 1892.Tippo, Oswald (1958). [https://www.biodiversitylibrary.org/page/5488695 "The Early History of the Botanical Society of America"]. Fifty Years of Botany. New York: McGraw-Hill. Retrieved 16 September 2012 from Biodiversity Heritage Library. The organizing principles of the society were the enhancement of the study of plants in North America and to professionalize such efforts.{{Citation |last=Smocovitis |first=Vassiliki Betty |title=One hundred years of American botany: a short history of the Botanical Society of America |date=April 20, 2006 |newspaper=American Journal of Botany |volume=93 |issue=7 |pages=942–952 |year= |url=https://www.amjbot.org/content/93/7/942.full |access-date= |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160211182635/http://www.amjbot.org/content/93/7/942.full |archive-date=February 11, 2016 |doi=10.3732/ajb.93.7.942 |last2= |first2= |author-link= |author-link2=}}. In 1906, the organization merged with the Society for Plant Morphology and Physiology and the American Mycological Society.{{cite web|url=http://www.botany.org/about_bsa/history.php |title=An Historical Overview of the BSA|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20070204143156/http://www.botany.org/about_bsa/history.php|archive-date=4 February 2007|url-status=live}}
Sections
The society has 16 special interest sections:
{{div col}}
- Bryological and lichenological
- Developmental and Structural
- Ecological
- Economic
- Genetics
- Historical
- Microbiological
- Mycological
- Paleobotanical
- Phycological
- Physiological
- Phytochemical
- Pteridological
- Systematic
- Teaching
- Tropical biology
{{div col end}}
Former presidents
{{main|Template:Presidents of the Botanical Society of America{{!}}Presidents of the Botanical Society of America}}
Former presidents of the society have included:
- William Trelease - Director of the Missouri Botanical Garden and the first president of the society
- Nathaniel Lord Britton - Cofounder of the New York Botanical Garden
- Margaret Clay Ferguson - Head of the Department of Botany at Wellesley College and the first female president of the society{{Cite journal|last=Rudolph|first=Emanuel D.|date=1982|title=Women in Nineteenth Century American Botany; A Generally Unrecognized Constituency |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/2442761|journal=American Journal of Botany|volume=69|issue=8|pages=1353|doi=10.1002/j.1537-2197.1982.tb13382.x|jstor=2442761}}
- William Francis Ganong - Professor of Botany, Smith College and historian and cartographer of New Brunswick
- Albert S. Hitchcock - Chief Botanist for the USDA
- William Chambers Coker - Founder of the Coker Arboretum at the University of North Carolina
- Katherine Esau - National Medal of Science recipient and namesake of the Katherine Esau Award in structural and developmental biology
- Vernon Cheadle - Chancellor of the University of California, Santa Barbara
- G. Ledyard Stebbins − evolutionary biologist at the University of California, Davis
- Peter H. Raven - Director of the Missouri Botanical Garden
- Loren Rieseberg - Professor of Botany at the University of British Columbia
Publications
The society publishes the following scientific journals:
- American Journal of Botany, since 1914
- Plant Science Bulletin, since 1955
- [https://bsapubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/journal/21680450 Applications in Plant Sciences], since 2009
References
{{Reflist}}
External links
- {{Official website|http://www.botany.org/}}
- [https://web.archive.org/web/20121114005711/http://www.botany.org/plantsciencebulletin/issues.php Archive of Plant Science Bulletin]
- Publications by the [https://www.biodiversitylibrary.org/creator/79 Botanical Society of America] at the Biodiversity Heritage Library
{{Presidents of the Botanical Society of America|state=collapsed}}
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Category:Professional associations based in the United States
Category:Missouri Botanical Garden
Category:Natural Science Collections Alliance members
Category:Non-profit organizations based in St. Louis
Category:501(c)(3) organizations
Category:Organizations established in 1893