TROY – A Troy University professor is playing a key role in a major botany project that has received a five-year, $498,877 National Science Foundation grant to create an online network of plant collections in the Southeast.

Dr. Michael Woods, professor of botany and herbarium curator with Troy University’s Department of Biological and Environmental Sciences, is Co-Project Director. This project, which is called the Southeast Regional Network of Expertise and Collections (SERNEC), will make the collections of the 150 herbaria, or plant museums, in the Southeast accessible and searchable on the World Wide Web. 

“Although this information will be used by scientists around the world, a major goal of this project is to provide information to the general public,” Dr. Woods said. “We hope to increase the public’s knowledge of the plant life around them.”

The herbaria in the Southeast house several million plant specimens that can provide information about plant migrations and plant diseases, Dr. Woods said. Scientists can use this information to understand how plants are distributed around the earth. This will help conservation biologists identify areas that need to be conserved and areas where plants could be moved to appropriate habitats in response to climatic changes.

Dr. Woods said 22 universities are participating in this project. Appalachian State University in Boone, N.C., is the coordinating institution. Major partners in the project are the U.S. Geological Survey’s National Biological Information Infrastructure (NBII), and its Southern Appalachian Information Node; and SunSITE, the information technology office of the University of Tennessee-Knoxville. 

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About Dr. Michael Woods: Dr. Woods, a native of Williamsburg, KY, joined the Troy University faculty in 1989. He received a bachelor’s degree from Cumberland (KY) College, a master’s degree from Murray (KY) State University and a Ph.D. from Southern Illinois University.