Pteridology — Ferns and fern allies

Dr. Alan Smith is in charge of the Pteridophytes and Grasses in the University Herbarium. He supervises all matters concerning pteridophyte collections and handles public service identifications for pteridophytes and grasses and plant identifications for campus, municipal, state, and federal agencies, as well as for private institutions and public universities.

His major research efforts during 1997--1998 included continued studies of higher-level phylogenetic relationships of ferns and fern allies (with Kathleen Pryer and Paul Wolf) and of phylogenetic relationships of Polypodiaceae/Grammitidaceae (with Tom Ranker and Chris Haufler). He also carried out floristic studies on Venezuelan pteridophytes, Bolivian pteridophytes (with J. Gonzáles and M. Kessler), pteridophytes of Mexico (with John Mickel et al.), and pteridophytes of Rarotonga, Cook Islands (with John Game). He continued collaboration with R. Moran to examine biogeography of pteridophytes having African--American distributions, in an evolutionary context.