Research

Research at the RHS

RHS cultivates botanists of the future

To help nurture budding botanists, the RHS, the UK's leading gardening charity, has launched the RHS Fellowship, a new initiative with Reading University, in a move which aims to benefit both science and gardeners, and address the lack of trained taxonomists working in the industry.

The scheme will see the RHS provide an annual scholarship for a student to undertake Reading University's highly regarded MSc in Plant Diversity, specialising in Taxonomy and Evolution. The selected student will receive £5,000 to cover tuition fees and living expenses, plus up to £2,500 for research materials.

As part of the one-year course, the RHS Fellow will follow two terms of formal teaching covering subjects such as plant systematics and families of flowering plants. The final three months will focus on taxonomic topics including the identification, classification and conservation of plants of garden value, with guidance available from botanists of both RHS Garden Wisley and Reading University. Graduates of the course are likely to embark on careers as plant taxonomists in botanic gardens, universities and museums throughout the UK and across the world.

The RHS Fellowship aims to help address the lack of trained taxonomists working in the industry, a concern highlighted in the recent report, 'What on Earth?', by the House of Lords Select Committee on Science and Technology.

Simon Thornton-Wood, Head of Science, Advice and Libraries for the RHS, said: "The RHS is delighted to offer students this Fellowship and help nurture a new generation of plant experts. Experts with taxonomic skills are vital to the conservation of plant life and, in turn, the natural environment as a whole. Combined with the exceptional facilities at the Centre for Plant Diversity at Reading University, this new Fellowship scheme can help close the taxonomy skills gap and make a real contribution to increasing the research and conservation of garden-worthy plants."

Previous research projects carried out by taxonomy undergraduates have focused upon the taxonomic problems within plant groups such as Erodium, Lavatera and Euonymus, using DNA sequencing or fingerprinting to identify mystery garden plants. This helps ascertain the breeding potential of a plant, uncover information about its rarity, and pinpoint its geographical origin. Studies into mystery hybrids have helped determine the unknown parents indicting whether the plant could be reproduced for the horticultural trade.

Details of the MSc in Plant Diversity are available on the University of Reading website at www.biosci.rdg.ac.uk/Teaching/MScPlantDiversity.htm. Anyone interested in applying for the RHS Fellowship should contact Dr Stephen Jury at The Centre for Plant Diversity and Systematics, School of Plant Sciences, The University of Reading, RG6 6AS. Or send an e-mail. Applicants must have a second-class Honours degree in Botany, Biology or a related subject.