Fellow of ASPB Award Committee
Peter Albersheim (1957)
University of Georgia
Peter is recognized for his seminal work on the chemistry of cell wall structure and function and for recognizing the role of the cell wall in cell signaling and pathogen interactions. In the late 1980s and early 1990s, Peter helped organize trips to Washington, D.C., to bring political awareness of the importance of plant biology research. These efforts were the beginnings of what became a focused commitment on the part of ASPB for public outreach and resulted in the hiring of a dedicated staff member and establishment of the ASPB Committee on Public Affairs.
Richard Amasino (1978)
University of Wisconsin
Rick is internationally recognized for his pioneering research on the regulation of flowering and vernalization. Rick's discovery of the FLC gene and molecular mechanisms regulating flowering is now an integral part of plant biology curriculum. To students of plant biology he is also known for his textbook photo reaching to the top of a Maryland Mammoth tobacco plant growing under long days. Rick served as president of ASPB in 2007 and wrote scholarly letters in the ASPB News challenging the membership to become actively engaged in energy conservation and teaching the public about science and evolution. Rick has also served on the editorial board of Plant Physiology® since 1997 and is currently an associate editor.
*Clanton Black (1957)
University of Georgia
Clanton is well recognized for his seminal work on C4 photosynthesis. His research team was the first to separate bundle sheath and mesophyll cells and study their metabolism. This innovation was critical for understanding C4 metabolism. Clanton worked at the biochemical level but understood and collaborated with others on plant research at higher levels. He served the Society, then known as the American Society of Plant Physiologists, as secretary, vice president, and president (1979). He served for nearly 10 years as a monitoring editor and was also an associate editor of
Plant Physiology®.
Hans Bohnert (1975)
University of Illinois
Hans is internationally recognized for his research on plant molecular and genetic reactions to environmental stress, especially high salinity. He is a pioneer in the utilization of genomics to further the understanding of salinity and drought responses of plants and in the use of the halophyte
Mesembryanthemum crystallinum (ice plant) as a model species. His numerous publications have had a huge impact on the field of environmental stress, and as such, he is an ISI highly cited researcher. Hans served as an associate editor for
Plant Physiology® from 1988 to 1992 and initiated the Plant Gene Register.
Rebecca Boston (1987)
North Carolina State UniversityBecky is an internationally recognized expert on the biochemistry and cell biology of maize seed proteins. Her work on protein misfolding revealed molecular mechanisms underlying the phenotype of several maize endosperm mutants. Becky served ASPB as a member of the Dennis Robert Hoagland Award Selection Committee (1994–1997), the Search Committee for Executive Director (1998), the Committee on the Status of Women in ASPP (1998–2001), the Executive Committee (elected member 1999–2002), and the Board of Trustees (2003–2007; chair 2005–2006). She has been active in mentoring young scientists through service in organizing, building participation and making presentations on Letters of Recommendation in the Plant Biology Career Development Workshops.
Robert Harza Burris (1948)
Professor Emeritus of Biochemistry, University of Wisconsin
Bob is best known for his research on biological nitrogen fixing, particularly on the enzyme nitrogenase, but he also investigated other aspects of plant biology including peroxidases and CAM metabolism. His lab developed many of the techniques for measuring nitrogen fixation in vivo. Bob served as president of ASPB in 1960 and has been a strong proponent of plant biology. He served on the editorial board of
Plant Physiology® for a number of years (1962–1966; 1972–1984) as well as on the editorial board of the ASPB Monograph series (1972–1974).
Nick Carpita (1975)
Purdue University
Nick has contributed wide-ranging discoveries to the field of plant cell walls. Taking a genome-wide approach, he has used non-invasive spectroscopy methods to identify and characterize mutants with impaired cell wall deposition. Recently he showed that small interfering RNAs were involved in the developmental regulation of cellulose synthase genes. Nick coauthored with Maureen McCann a comprehensive and elegant description of plant cell wall in the book Biochemistry & Molecular Biology of Plants. He has served the Society in multiple capacities, including as secretary, chair of the Program Committee, member of the Executive Committee, and monitoring editor of Plant Physiology®. He also initiated the idea of, and then organized, a Pan-American meeting on Plants and BioEnergy in Merida, Mexico, in 2008.
Vicki Chandler (1990)
University of Arizona
Vicki is internationally recognized for her pioneering work on epigenetic control of gene expression. Her research has led to a new understanding of chromatin structure and revealed an underlying mechanism involved in paramutation. She served ASPB as a member of the editorial board of Plant Physiology® (1995–2001), member of the ASPB Executive Committee (1998–2001), and president (2002). Her strong leadership was essential as the Society considered name changes for the journal Plant Physiology®, digitized the entire archive of both Plant Physiology® and The Plant Cell, and pushed forward with the The Arabidopsis Book, ASPB's online-only, free-access compendium.
Eric Conn (1951)
University of California
Eric is recognized for his seminal work in secondary plant metabolism. His discovery of phenylalanine ammonia-lyase laid the foundation for our current understanding of the phenylpropenoid pathway. In addition, his research on the metabolism and localization of cyanogenic glycosides is internationally recognized. Along with Paul Stumpf, Eric wrote the textbook Outlines in Biochemistry and edited 16 volumes of
The Biochemistry of Plants, a comprehensive treatise, from 1980 to 1990. Eric has been a member of ASPB since 1951 and served as assistant editor of
Plant Physiology® from 1968 to 1972, as an editorial board member of
Plant Physiology® from 1980 to 1983, and as president 1987.
Roland Douce (1976)
DBMS/PCV
Roland has made seminal contributions to our understanding of the structure and function of plant mitochondria and also of the chloroplast envelope. He has served and supported ASPB in several significant ways. These include service as a monitoring editor of
Plant Physiology® from 1980 to 1990, collaborating with young and established scientists around the world, and being a strong leader and mentor to many young scientists. His efforts have attracted international young scientists to the field of plant biology and to membership in ASPB.
Pamela Green (1989)
University of Delaware
Pam is a pioneer in the field of RNA metabolism. Her research has made a significant impact in the areas of gene regulation and RNA stability in plants. She used genetic and biochemical approaches to study the control of mRNA decay in plants, laying the foundation for understanding post-transcriptional gene regulation. This research led to new insights into plant siRNAs and microRNAs and their targets. Pam served ASPB from 1996 to 2001 as a member of the Publications Committee and as a member of the Program Committee from 1993 to 1996.
Mary Lou Guerinot (1991)
Dartmouth College
Mary Lou pioneered approaches to study the molecular mechanisms of iron and zinc transport in plants and continues to lay the foundation for the development of crops that offer sustainable solutions to metal malnutrition. She is also leading and coordinating collaborative research efforts to study ionomics in Arabidopsis and rice and to identify gene networks that control the mineral ion content of plants. She has served ASPB as president (2003–2004), member of the Program Committee, Executive Committee, Board of Trustees, and ASPB Education Foundation.
Alan Jones (1982)
University of North Carolina
Alan is recognized for his work in plant signal transduction, starting with studies to identify auxin-binding proteins to his recent work on the role of heterotrimeric G-proteins in sugar, hormonal, and stress signaling. At ASPB, he served seven years as a monitoring editor and since 2005 as an associate editor of
Plant Physiology®. He has also served on the Program Committee and the ASPB Bylaws Committee. He is currently a member of the Executive Committee.
Robert Last (1989)
Michigan State University
Rob is recognized for his use of genetic approaches to characterize amino acid biosynthetic pathways and their roles in stress responses in plants. His work has made the tryptophan pathway the most extensively genetically characterized amino acid biosynthetic pathway in plants. Rob served ASPB as a monitoring editor of
Plant Physiology® in 1994 and as an associate editor since 1999. He has organized and coedited several special issues and series of the journal and was also on the ad hoc committee considering a genomics journal from 1998 to 2000. He is the editor-in-chief of
The Arabidopsis Book, ASPB's free-access, online-only compendium. He has been a strong advocate for plant biology and is currently a member of the Committee on Public Affairs.
Peggy G. Lemaux (1984)
University of California
Peggy is recognized as a leader in cereal transformation. She developed user-friendly transformation protocols, which are widely used for developing transgenic crops. Peggy is an internationally recognized spokesperson for plant biotechnology and is committed to increasing public understanding of biotechnology and the potential benefits to the Society. Her commitment to public outreach and education is demonstrated in her service to ASPB. She served as chair and member of the Committee on Public Affairs from 1997 to 2003, during a time when there were many debates about genetically modified organisms. In addition, she has served as a member of the ASPB Education Foundation since 2003.
Carl Leopold (1948)
Cornell University
Carl has had a long and distinguished career in plant physiology, both as a research scientist and as an administrator and promoter of plant biology. In research he has made major contributions in the areas of gravity sensing, seed dormancy, ion physiology, and the synthesis and action of plant growth regulators (auxin, ethylene, abscisic acid). He is the author of the book
Plant Growth and Development. He served as president of the Society, then known as the American Society of Plant Physiologists, from 1965 to 1966 and as vice president from 1958 to 1959. He served on the editorial board of
Plant Physiology® from 1956 to 1974. Carl is active in the Leopold Foundation, the Finger Lakes Land Trust, and the Tropical Forestry Initiative, an ongoing project aimed at reclaiming rain forest habitat in Costa Rica.
Stephen Long (1999)
University of Illinois
Steve's research has provided the scaffolding for connecting the environmental responses of plants in the field to the basic mechanisms of photosynthesis, most notably in the plant responses to rising carbon dioxide and tropospheric ozone. His work in this area has lead to new understanding of how major crop plants will respond to these future environmental challenges. He has also been a champion of the use of
Miscanthus x giganteus, a high-biomass, cold-tolerant C4 species, as a bioenergy crop. Steve has served on both the Publications and Program Committees. He was a lead organizer for two ASPB-sponsored meetings, The Biology of Transpiration (2006) and The Pan American Congress on Plants & BioEnergy (2008), and for two global change symposia at ASPB annual meetings.
C. Robertson McClung (1989)
Dartmouth College
Rob is recognized for his fundamental research to unravel the circuits that make up the circadian clock in Arabidopsis and cyanobacteria. His work has provided key insights into the roles of temperature and light in setting the clock and how natural regulation of the clock affects plant fitness. He was a member of the Committee on the Status of Women in Plant Physiology (since renamed the Women in Plant Biology Committee) from 1997 to 2000. He served as member and chair of the Publications Committee from 2002 to 2007 and has been a member of the Executive Committee since 2003. He served ASPB as president in 2008. He is also on the editorial board of
The Arabidopsis Book.
John Ohlrogge (1979)
Michigan State University
John's research on fatty acid synthesis and lipid metabolic pathways has earned him an international reputation as an authority in the field of plant lipid metabolism. His holistic approach including biochemistry and genomics has led to seminal discoveries critical to the understanding of the lipid system, including lipid polymers such as cutin and suberin, and the regulation of metabolic flux. John has served ASPB as a monitoring editor of
Plant Physiology® from 1984 to 1992 and from 1995 to 1996 and as an associate editor since 2005.
Mel Oliver (1986)
USDA-ARS, Plant Genetics Research Unit, University of Missouri
Mel has pioneered research into the underlying mechanisms of vegetative desiccation tolerance and its importance in the evolution of the land plants. His studies with Tortula ruralis, the vegetative desiccation-tolerant bryophyte model, and comparative work with more complex species have demonstrated the importance of rehydration in the evolutionary pathways for desiccation and drought tolerance. Mel was very active in the ASPB Southern Section, including serving as chair in 1999. At the national level, Mel served on the Executive Committee and was chair of the Membership Committee from 2002–2009. In addition, he is an organizer of the First Global Strategic Summit of Plant Science Societies, to be held in 2009.
Federico Sanchez (1998)
Instituto De Biotecnología, Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México
Federico Sanchez is one of the leaders of plant molecular biology in Mexico. His research centers on nitrogen metabolism, nodulin gene expression, and
Rhizobium inoculation-induced effects on the plant cytoskeleton in the
Rhizobium-Phaseolus (bean) symbiosis. Bean is an important crop for Mexico, but was not considered to be a very good experimental system because it, like most legumes, is recalcitrant to agro-transformation. Federico and his colleagues developed a root transformation system that overcame this difficulty. He has organized symposia at past ASPB meetings, and with other Mexican colleagues also organized the 2008 meeting of ASPB and the Sociedad Mexicana de Bioquímica in Mérida, Mexico.
Lawrence Schrader (1964)
Washington State University
Larry is recognized for his early research on nitrogen metabolism, which revealed the interdependence of carbon and nitrogen assimilation in crop plants, and for his more recent work that has resulted in new methods to improve the postharvest physiology of fruit crops. He served as secretary of ASPB from 1983 to 1985 and as a member of the editorial board of
Plant Physiology® from 1979 to 1980 and 1983 to 1987. Larry served as president of ASPB in 1987, the year that planning for
The Plant Cell commenced.
Edgar Spalding (1987)
University of Wisconsin
Edgar is recognized for his research in the fields of photobiology, electrophysiology, and growth analysis. Through rigorous analysis of the kinetics of growth, Edgar has defined the contributions of molecular regulators and produced comprehensive data describing the roles of various photoreceptors in photomorphogenesis. Edgar's contributions to ASPB are numerous, including roles on the Membership Committee (2000–2003), on the Program Committee (2003–2007), and as secretary (2003–2005). He is currently serving on the Board of Trustees. Edgar also has been a monitoring editor for
Plant Physiology® (2003–2008) and has organized numerous minisymposia at the annual meeting.
Michael Thomashow (1987)
Michigan State University
Although Mike's early work was on tumor formation in plants by
Agrobacterium tumefaciens, he is most recognized for his groundbreaking work in the elucidation of the CFB cold response pathway in Arabidopsis, which has a key role in cold acclimation and freezing tolerance. His scientific contributions to the area of cold acclimation and freezing tolerance have stood the test of time. Mike has had an active role in ASPB, serving on the
Plant Physiology® editorial board (1988–1992; 1999–2005), as a member of many committees, and as ASPB president (2005–2006).
Mary Tierney (1987)
Univeristy of Vermont
Mary is well known for her research on cell wall structural proteins, especially proline-rich proteins, and investigates their expression in root hairs and stomata. She has organized several scientific meetings dealing with the cell wall and is a strong advocate for her area of study. Mary has been active in ASPB, having served as chair of the Women in Plant Biology Committee and as a section delegate to the Executive Committee. She is currently a member of the Board of Trustees (2007–2011). Mary was a monitoring editor for
Plant Physiology® (2002–2007) and also helped organize ASPB's Lab Leadership Workshop held at the annual meeting in 2007.
Carroll Vance (1976)
USDA-ARS, Agronomy Plant Genetics, University of Minnesota
Carroll has been one of the leaders in studying the development and physiology of indeterminate nodules from a genetics perspective, beginning with his pioneering work on alfalfa (
Medicago sativa), which is an out crossing, tetraploid legume, and continuing with the diploid model legume
Medicago truncatula. His work contributed to the physiology, biochemistry, and functional genomics of both plant–microbe interactions and plant adaptation to P stress. Carroll has been a member of ASPB since 1976 and has been active in ASPB both in an editorial capacity and also as a participant in meetings. He served as monitoring editor of
Plant Physiology® from 1985 to 1992 and from 1995 to present. He was reappointed monitoring editor in 2005 and is still serving in that capacity.
Kathryn VandenBosch (1981)
University of Minnesota
Kate is recognized for her research on plant defensins as well as genes expressed in nitrogen-fixing nodules. She has been actively involved in developing resources for the
Medicago community and also has contributed by organizing workshops and research teams for funding opportunities. Along with Carroll Vance, Kate has been one of the leaders in advancing the cause of
Medicago truncatula as a model legume for the study of symbiotic nitrogen fixation and for plant pathogenic interactions. She served as monitoring editor (2002–2005) and is currently an associate editor (2007 to present) for
Plant Physiology®. In addition, she was a guest editor for two issues on legumes (March 2003 and April 2005).
Larry N. Vanderhoef (1966)
University of California
Larry built his reputation in plant physiology on his work on auxin biology and its regulation of plant growth and development. He eventually moved into academic leadership, culminating in an appointment as the chancellor of UC Davis, where he served for 15 years. Despite his absence from the laboratory, Larry maintained an active interest in plant biology throughout his leadership service and remained involved in ASPB, including serving as secretary/treasurer of the Midwest Section (1979–1980) and as ASPB treasurer (1982–1987). His service was manifold, but his greatest impact came during his leadership on the Board of Trustees, where he was instrumental in launching
The Plant Cell and securing its success.
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