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Sula Vanderplank

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Bahia de San Quintín
As Herbarium Collections Manager at Rancho Santa Ana Botanic Garden I manage the day-to-day operation of the herbarium.  This includes administration of the herbarium databases; coordinating and/or performing routine collection management (preparation of plant specimens for the RSA herbarium, specimen filing, sending and receiving of loans, gifts, exchanges, and other transactions, record keeping activity); associated record keeping activity and training and supervision of Curatorial Interns, lower level Curatorial Assistants, graduate student Research Assistants, and volunteers.  I also participate in floristic research and assist the Curator and Botanical Field Studies Coordinator with various projects.

My current interests are based in learning the plants of the California Floristic Province, and my research focus is The Vascular Flora of Greater San Quintín (La flora vascular de San Quintín y áreas adyacentes), Baja California, MX.  I have passion for the plants of the arid lands and ‘big picture science’ for botany and natural history collections.  I am an active board member for Southern California Botanists (www.socalbot.org) and The Society of Herbarium Curators (www.societyofherbariumcurators.org).

My research interests previously focused on the phylogenetics of Passiflora, however my current activity in this area is very limited. 

Vanderplank, J. & S. Vanderplank (2006)  Passiflora longicuspis.  Curtis’s Botanical Magazine, 2006 Vol. 23 (3) pp 223-230.

The International Botanical Conference (July 2005), Vienna, Austria.

  • Shawn Krosnick, Mac H. Alford, Sula Vanderplank, John Freudenstein, and David Hearn. ‘Phylogeny and Evolution of the Passiflorineae.’

The ASP-CRN Interim Symposium on Botanicals and Dietary Supplements (November 2001), Monterey, California, USA.

  •   S. E. Vanderplank, J. R. Vanderplank, A.W. Douglas, I. A. Khan & B. E. Scheffler. 'Phylogenetic Relationships in Passiflora (Passifloraceae), Investigated using the Internal Transcribed Spacers nrDNA.' (Paper Pending)
  • Sara L. Crockett, Brian E. Scheffler, Andrew W. Douglas, Sula Vanderplank, Ihklas A. Khan.  'Genetic and Phytochemical Differentiation of Various Species of Hypericum.'

Taxonomy Today ‘Diversity and the tree of life’ Conference (July 2000), The University of Reading, UK.

  • Vanderplank, S., Culham, A. & J. Vanderplank.  ‘A preliminary phylogeny of Passiflora (Passifloraceae) inferred from cpDNA TrnL-F and mtDNA NAD 1 intron sequences.’

Thesis for completion of Bachelor of Science degree (Jan 2000):

  • ‘A preliminary phylogeny of Passiflora (Passifloraceae) inferred from cpDNA TrnL-F and mtDNA NAD 1 intron sequences.’