Botany: A Growing Field at SUNY Plattsburgh

Program, Professor Take Home Multiple National Honors

PLATTSBURGH, N.Y. (Aug. 18, 2010) – When it comes to botany, Dr. Chris Martine and his students from SUNY Plattsburgh are racking up the honors.

The associate professor of biological sciences was one of only two faculty worldwide to receive this year’s Charles Edwin Bessey Teaching Award from the Botanical Society of America. Martine is, in fact, the first faculty member from the State University of New York to ever receive this honor.

But that’s not all. This year, out of the six students chosen for the Botanical Society of America’s Undergraduate Research Awards, three were SUNY Plattsburgh students working under Martine. They were Alex Scharf (an environmental studies major cultivating and studying a rare eggplant co-discovered by Martine), Sasha Dow-Kitson (a biology major who is working to gain a better understanding of European frogbit, an invasive species) and Elizabeth “Betty” Lavoie (a co-discoverer of a second eggplant species, who is working to analyze its DNA).

The awards don’t end there: Lavoie and Jillian Post, a senior environmental science major and art minor, were both named Young Botanists of the Year by the Botanical Society of America. This is the third year in a row that SUNY Plattsburgh students have come to hold this honor. It goes to between 15 and 25 outstanding undergraduate students from all over North America.

Interim Provost and Vice President for Academic Affairs Patricia Higgins felt that Martine was a good choice for the teaching award.

“Dr. Bessey was renowned for developing botanical education in the United States,” Higgins said. “It is, therefore, fitting that Dr. Martine should be one of this year’s recipients of this award. His passion for and skills as a teacher/scholar of botany are commendable.”

Videos of Martine’s students discussing their work are available for viewing at http://bit.ly/EuropeanFrogbit and http://bit.ly/RareResearch.

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