Edwards, Sara L.
Job Title
Herbarium Assistant
Department
Herbarium, Library, Art & Archives
Section
Regional Teams
Science Teams:
Joined Kew:
2002Foreign Language(s):
Portuguese (working), French (working)Qualifications & Appointments
BSc (Hons), Environmental Biology, City College Norwich, 1998.
Cert. level 2. RHS Horticulture, Richmond Adult Community College, 2009.
Role
Curatorial support for the Tropical America regional team, and research into Neotropical Malvaceae, Aristolochiaceae, Passifloraceae and Pouteria (Sapotaceae). Member of Kew’s Pest Management Team.
Sara’s curatorial responsibilities include sorting and naming incoming Central and South American specimens. This involves laying away specimens into the collections, recurating collections according to new revisions, adding information to databases such as CRIS, HerbCat and BRAHMS, and processing outgoing and incoming loans and digitizing specimens for image requests. She also hosts team visiting botanists, supervising team volunteers, and training new staff and volunteers in curation and pest management. Sara is a member of the Kew pest management team and her responsibilities include monitoring and replacing insect traps and dealing with infestations (freezing specimens and treating infested areas with Constrain®). As part of the research projects Sara has undertaken botanical fieldwork in Brazil, Montserrat, French Guiana and participated in UK Millenium Seedbank collecting expeditions. Sara has also participated in specialist identification, and taxonomic/floristic research of Neotropical Aristolochiaceae, Malvaceae, Passifloraceae, and Pouteria (Sapotaceae).
Projects
Selected Recent Publications
Biggs, N., Edwards, S., Frisby, S. & Klitgård, B. B. (2011). Interactive key to neotropical Malvaceae - Malvoideae. http://www.kew.org/science/tropamerica/malvaceae.htm (accessed June 30th, 2011).
Edwards, S. (2010). Aristolochiaceae. In: Milliken, W., Klitgård, B. & Baracat, A. Neotropikey - Interactive key and information resources for flowering plants of the Neotropics. www.kew.org/neotropikey (accessed June 30th, 2011).
Edwards, S. (2010). Pellicieraceae. In: Milliken, W., Klitgård, B. & Baracat, A. Neotropikey - Interactive key and information resources for flowering plants of the Neotropics. www.kew.org/neotropikey (accessed June 30th, 2011).
Edwards, S. & Leon, C. (2007). Plate 584. Isotrema manshuriense (Aristolochiaceae). Curtis's Bot. Mag. 24(2): 86 – 92.
Clark, R. P., Edwards, S. L. & Harvey, Y. (2007). Herbarium Pests – An Age Old Problem and New Solutions. Poster presented at: Pest Management in Practice. A Care of Collections Group Workshop. Imperial War Museum.
