Sandra Knapp facts for kids
Quick facts for kids
Sandra Diane Knapp
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| Born | 1956 (age 68–69) |
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| Employer | Natural History Museum, London |
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| Author abbrev. (botany) | S.Knapp |
Sandra Diane Knapp (born in 1956) is an amazing American-born botanist. A botanist is a scientist who studies plants. She is a top researcher at the Natural History Museum in London.
From 2018, she was the president of the Linnean Society of London, a famous group for natural history. While at the Natural History Museum, she helped create the Flora Mesoamericana, which is a huge list of plants found in Central America. She has written many books and scientific articles about plants. In 2016, she won the Linnean Medal for her work. In 2022, she became a Fellow of the Royal Society, which is a very special honor for scientists. In 2023, she was given the Officer of the Order of the British Empire (OBE) award and the Engler Medal in Gold for her outstanding contributions to plant science.
Contents
Learning About Plants
Sandra Knapp studied botany at Pomona College and earned her first degree in 1978. She then went on to get her PhD from Cornell University in 1986. A PhD is a very high degree that shows you are an expert in your field.
What She Studies
Dr. Knapp is an expert in a group of plants called Solanum. This group includes many different types of plants, like tomatoes (Solanum lycopersicum). She also knows a lot about other plants in the nightshade family, which is called Solanaceae. This family includes plants like tobacco (Nicotiana).
She has traveled to Central and South America to collect plants for different universities and gardens. Collecting plants helps scientists learn more about them.
Her Work at the Museum
Since 1992, Dr. Knapp has been a scientific researcher in the botany department at the Natural History Museum in London. She does fieldwork, which means she goes out into nature to study plants. She also works in the herbarium, which is like a library for dried plant samples.
She helps with a big project called the Planetary Biodiversity Inventory project Solanum. This project aims to map all the nightshade plants around the world. She also works on a project to understand how tobacco plants have changed over time. Dr. Knapp is also an editor for the Flora Mesoamericana series, which lists all the plants found in a region called Mesoamerica.
Books and Awards
Dr. Knapp has written several books about plants and plant exploration. She has also written over 200 scientific articles that have been reviewed by other experts. Her book Potted Histories was translated into French as Le Voyage Botanique. In 2004, this French version won the Prix Pierre-Joseph Redouté, an award for the best French plant book of the year.
She has also named many new plant species, especially in the nightshade family. She even named some passion flowers with another scientist. One of these, Passiflora macdougaliana, was named after a passion flower expert. In return, that expert named a passion flower, Passiflora sandrae, after Dr. Knapp!
Important Groups and Societies
Dr. Knapp is part of many important groups and committees. She helps decide who gets awards for new ideas in science. She is also on committees that give out grants for research.
She played a very important role in 2011 and 2017 at the International Botanical Congress meetings. She led committees that updated the rules for naming plants, algae, and fungi. These changes made it easier to publish new plant names online and to find existing names. In 2018, she became the president of the Linnean Society of London. She is also a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.
Sharing Science with Everyone
Dr. Knapp loves to share her knowledge about plants with the public. She has been a guest on many radio shows, including the BBC World Service's Science in Action and The Forum.
She has talked about famous naturalists like Alfred Russel Wallace and Carl Linnaeus. She also explained how photosynthesis works on the BBC Radio 4 programme In Our Time. In 2014, she was a guest on The Museum of Curiosity, a fun radio show where guests donate a hypothetical item to a fictional museum. Her donation was a freeze-dried potato product from South America called Chuño. She also chose "Miss Alice Eastwood" as her hero in a radio series about natural history heroes.
Awards and Honors
Dr. Knapp has received many awards for her amazing work. In 2016, she won the Linnean Medal, sharing it with another scientist. In 2009, she received the Peter Raven Outreach Award for sharing science with the public. She also won the John Burnett Medal.
She has been given honorary professorships by University College London and Stockholm University. In 2022, she received the David Fairchild Medal for Plant Exploration. The same year, she was elected as a Fellow of the Royal Society, which is a very high honor for scientists in the UK.
In 2023, Dr. Knapp was appointed an Officer of the Order of the British Empire (OBE) for her contributions to botany and helping people understand science. Also in 2023, she received the Engler Medal in Gold for her lifetime of outstanding work in classifying and understanding plants, algae, and fungi. This award was presented in July 2024.
See also
In Spanish: Sandra Diane Knapp para niños
- Category:Taxa named by Sandra Knapp
