Thiers, Barbara Mary (1955 - )
Born 9 February 1955 in College Station, Texas, USA;
She grew up in San Francisco, California, where her father was a mycologist and founder of the San Francisco State University Herbarium.
She graduated with a B.A. from San Francisco State University in 1977, and a PhD from University of Massachusetts in 1982.
Her dissertation was:
'Branching in the Lejeuneaceae (Hepaticae)', with Advisor: Rudolf M. Schuster.
After completing her PhD she accepted a postdoctoral fellowship at the New York Botanical Garden, where her project was to curate the William Mitten bryophyte herbarium. This collection (probably 50,000 specimens) contained specimens "collected by just about every famous botanical collector".
She was able to stay on at the Garden when her postdoc ended, and gradually worked her way up through the administration to become Director of the Herbarium from 2000.
In her early years at NYBG she had the opportunity for quite a bit of international tropical fieldwork, including collecting Lejeuneaceae in Australia, Papua New Guinea and South America.
A priority in those years was the development of a collections digitization program at NYBG, and furthering such efforts on a national and international level.
After the Covid pandemic she realized that she wanted to substitute administration for more direct work with plants. Her husband, Roy E. Halling, a mycologist, also retired from NYBG, and they moved to live in the Denver, Colorado metropolitan area, where they became Research Adjuncts at the Denver Botanic Gardens.
Relevant Fieldwork dates:
- June-July 1984: Tropical regions of Queensland, Australia.
- August 1984: Papua New Guinea.
Source: Extracted from:
https://www.nybg.org/images/scientists/22-BarbaraThiers_CV.pdf
https://bryology.org/barbara-thiers/
Portrait Photo: Extracted from https://bryology.org/barbara-thiers/
Australian collecting localities for 'Thiers, B.M.' from AVH (2024)
Data from 596 specimens in Australian herbaria
