Tod F. Stuessy – författare

The Juan Fernández Archipelago is located in the Pacific Ocean west of Chile at 33° S latitude. Robinson Crusoe Island is 667 km from the continent and approximately four million years old; Alejandro Selkirk Island is an additional 181 km west and only one million years old. The natural impacts of subsidence and erosion have shaped the landscapes of these islands, resulting in progressive changes to their subtropical vegetation. The older island has undergone more substantial changes, due to both natural causes and human impacts. After the discovery of Robinson Crusoe Island in 1574, people began cutting down forests for lumber to construct boats and homes, for firewood, and to make room for pastures. Domesticated plants and animals were introduced, some of which have since become feral or invasive, causing damage to the local vegetation. The wealth of historical records on these activities provides a detailed chronicle of how human beings use their environment for survival in a newecosystem. This book offers an excellent case study on the impacts that people can have on the resources of an oceanic island. 

This book focuses on plant systematics and evolution, with special interest on the history and philosophy of botanical classification. Tracing the history of how humans have dealt with ordering the plant world is very much a glimpse of how human culture and science have progressed over the past 2000 years.  The objective in this book is to present ideas on plant classification beginning with classical Greek and Roman scholars, through the Middle Ages, into the Renaissance, and finally to the modern 21st century. Significant quantitative methods in classification have originated within the past 70 years, which have never before been integrated with previous historical perspectives.  Most textbooks of systematic botany contain an historical introduction or perhaps a chapter on the history of classification, but this book presents much greater detail on the classifications themselves and the cultural dimensions of the different time periods. Biographical detail is also provided to give a better appreciation of the individual botanists who have contributed new ideas in the search for maximally predictive systems.

Chromosomal change has been important in the evolution of flowering plants. Cytogenetic modifications resulting in dysploid and polyploid alterations of plant genomes have often led to the formation of new species. A genus that represents an excellent example of such changes during its evolutionary history is Melampodium (Asteraceae), occurring primarily in Mexico, Central America, and the southwestern United States. This book is a detailed presentation of the diversity of species in Melampodium, their ecological requirements and phylogenetic relationships, the biogeographic patterns and migrational pathways, chromosomal diversity, and evolutionary origins of species, especially the tetraploids and hexaploids through allopolyploidy. It is an instructive case study of evolution through chromosomal change in a broadly distributed genus of importance in the ecosystems of Mexico and adjacent regions.