Remembering W. Alan Charlton: a great friend and supporter of Canadian botany

Abstract

Alan Charlton was born in Prestwich (Manchester, England) on the 27th of December, 1938, and died in the South Lake District town of Ulverston, England, on the 8th of July, 2013. Although Alan was born, lived, and worked in and aroundManchester, England, for most of his life, he was to some extent a Canadian at heart. During his long and distinguished career as an outstanding botanical researcher, Alan seemed to have one foot firmly planted in Canada. He received a Master's degree at the University of Saskatchewan, published 28 articles in the Canadian Journal of Botany (now Botany), and collaboratedwith andmentored many members of the Canadian Botanical Association / Association Botanique du Canada (CBA/ABC). In fact, Alan was a member of the CBA/ABC for many years, attending and contributing to numerous meetings. Alan’s parents came from the North East of England, the area around Newcastle-upon-Tyne whose residents are colloquially referred to as Geordies. His father was a research chemist with Imperial Chemical Industries and his mother was trained in domestic science at a well-established regional college. Alan received a scholarship to attend Bury Grammar School and then spent a year at Salford Technical College. He was a keen longdistance cyclist and very involved in building and flying model aircraft and keeping tropical fish. In 1957, Alan entered The University of Manchester to study Botany. He graduated in 1960 with a First Class degree in Botany and then moved on to the University of Saskatchewan at Saskatoon to work on his M.Sc. with Taylor Steeves. At this stage, Alan’s tremendous interest in plant morphogenesis developed and various aspects of it formed the basis of his research for the rest of his career. In Saskatoon, his focus was on the roots of the weedy species Linaria vulgaris. Alan’s respect and affection for Taylor were very deep and he kept in close touch with him for the rest of his life. In 1962, Alan returned to Manchester. The work from his masters was published in 1966 in the Canadian Journal of Botany in a series of two articles, “The root system of Linaria vulgaris Mill.: I. Morphology and anatomy” and “The root system of Linaria vulgarisMill.: II. Differentiation of root types”. At The University of Manchester, he began his Ph.D. studies with Professor Claude Wardlaw, probably the foremost plant morphogeneticist at that time. In 1964, Alan was awarded a Ph.D. degree. His thesis was entitled, “Anatomical and experimental investigations of roots of the Linaria vulgaris Mill.” After obtaining his Ph.D., Alan was appointed as lecturer at The University of Manchester and continued his research. He also met a young graduate student, Anne Turner, who was completing her Ph.D. with Wardlaw. They married on the 22nd of September, 1965. After graduating, Anne also took up a position at The University of Manchester but she moved away from the study of plants and established an internationally renowned research group focusing on cancer education, which was closely associated with Cancer Research UK. Anne’s work with children and smoking became world famous and she was duly recognized with a professorship, becoming Professor of Cancer Health Education in the Medical School. As can be seen from Alan’s M.Sc. and Ph.D., his first interests were dicot roots but he soon moved on to water plants, specifically at that stage in the 1960s to Echinodorus tenellus. This was the first of a series of papers on the Alismataceae in which he described the development of the shoots of Echinodorus and the developmental stages leading to the reproductive phase. There would be a remarkable 12 papers in the Alismataceae series, all published in the Canadian Journal of Botany and ending in 2004with the paper, “Alismataceae. XII. Floral organogenesis in Damasonium alisma and Baldellia ranunculoides, and comparison with Butomus umbellatus”. Always interested in the mathematics of plants and their development, several of Alan’s research studies had a mathematical basis. Because he considered that studies on stomatal development inmonocot leaves were lagging behind those of dicots, Alan studied stomatal patterns in Chlorophytum comosum, Galanthus nivalis, Schizostylis coccinea, and Scilla lanicifolia in the mid 1980s, publishing the work in Annals of Botany. Mathematics also played an important role in the investigation of primary vascular patterns in root meristems in Pontederia iii