Paton, Alan
Job Title
Assistant Keeper, Herbarium, Library, Art & Archives Directorate
Department
Herbarium, Library, Art & Archives
Section
Biodiversity Information and Economic Botany
Science Teams:
Joined Kew:
1990Foreign Language(s):
FrenchQualifications & Appointments
BSc (Hons), Univ. Edinburgh, 1986
PhD, Univ. Edinburgh, 1989.
Coordination Mechanism, Global Taxonomy Initiative of the CBD
Plants Conservation Committee, IUCN-SSC
Red List Commitee, IUCN
Editorial Board of Phytokeys
Fellow of the Linnean Society of London
Role
Management of the Biodiversity Information and Economic Botany Section of the Herbarium; Lamiaceae research; implementation of Global Strategy for Plant Conservation (GSPC).
My principal role is to manage the staff of the Biodiversity Information and Economic Botany section and to seek ways of maximizing the impact of information held within the herbarium collection on conservation and sustainable use. This includes supervision of the following teams: Economic Botany Collection, Collections Management Unit, Herbarium Digitisation, GIS, World Checklists and the International Plant Names Index, Morphometrics and Identification Aids and input into Kew’s Science and Horticulture Systems project. From 2002-2010 I was responsible for liaising with the Secretariat of the CBD on progress on Target 1 of the Global Strategy for Plant Conservation (GSPC -a widely accessible list of all known plant species) and I was part of the production team who produced The Plant List (www.theplantlist.org). I also have an interest in developing preliminary conservation assessments (Target 2 GSPC) from specimen data. I have recently received a Grant from the Wellcome Trust for a 3.5 year project to develop ‘Plant name information services in support of medicinal and pharmaceutical research’.
My taxonomic research is centred on African and Asian Lamiaceae, writing accounts of the family for Flora of Thailand and Flora Zambesiaca. I also pursue monographic and phylogenetic research in tribe Ocimeae and have published several multidisciplinary papers on Ocimum (basil) and Plectranthus .
Projects
- African Lamiaceae
- African Plants Initiative
- Australian Virtual Herbarium
(project completed 2006) - Authentication and Chemical Fingerprinting of Economically Important Species
- Diversity of Biologically Active Plants and Plant-Derived Compound
- Biodiversity Advice to Government
- Chemosystematics and biological activity of Lamiaceae
- Climate Change Science Policy
- Co-Evolution at the Plant-Animal Interface
(project completed 2010) - Conservation Assessment Tracking System (CATS)
- e-Floras
- European Distributed Institute of Taxonomy (EDIT)
(project completed 2011) - Flora of Tropical East Africa
- Flora Zambesiaca
- GeoCAT – Geospatial Conservation Assessment Tool
- Global Plants Initiative
- Global overview of Lamiaceae and related families
- HOTSPOTS - understanding and conserving the Earth's biodiversity hotspots - COMPLETED 2009
- Gateway to African Plants
- iPlants (project completed 2006)
- International Plant Names Index (IPNI)
- Kew Record of Taxonomic Literature
(project ended 2008) - Southeast Asian Floristics: Lamiaceae
- Medicinal Plant Names Services
- New World Lamiaceae
- OpenUp! – Opening up the European natural history heritage for Europeana
- Plant-Insect Interactions
- Salvia (Lamiaceae)
- Sampled Red List Index for Plants
- Science and Horticulture Systems
- Systematics of Lamiaceae subfamily Viticoideae and allies
- Systematics, Sustainable Use and Conservation of Tribe Ocimeae (Basil and Allies, Lamiaceae)
- Target 1 of the Global Strategy for Plant Conservation 2010- A working list of known plant species.
- World classification and phylogeny of Salix & Populus
- Latin American Plants Initiative
Selected Recent Publications
Paton, A.J. & Nic Lughadha, E. (2011). The irresistible target meets the unachievable objective: what have 8 years of GSPC implementation taught us about target setting and achievable objectives? Botanical Journal of the Linnean Society 166: 250–260.
Knapp, S., Paton, A., Challis, K. and Nicolson, N. (2010). "Run for your lives! End of the world!" - Electronic publication of new plant names. Taxon 59: 1009-1010.
Paton, A. (2009). Biodiversity informatics and the plant conservation baseline. Trends in Plant Science 14: 629-637.
- Paton, A.J., Bramley, G., Ryding, O., Polhill, R.M., Harvey, Y.B., Iwarsson, M., Willis, F, Phillipson, P.B., Balkwill, K., Lukhoba, C.W., Oteino, D., & Harley, R.M. in Beetje, H.J., Ghazanfar, S.A. & Polhill, R.M. (eds) (2009). Flora of East Tropical Africa. Lamiaceae (Labiatae). 430 pp. RBG Kew.
- Paton, A.J., Brummitt, N., Govaerts, R., Harman, K. Hinchcliffe, S., Allkin, R. & NicLughadha, E. (2008). Towards Target 1 Of The Global Strategy For Plant Conservation: A Working List Of All Known Plant Species – Progress and Prospects. Taxon 57: 602–611
- Lukhoba, C.W., .Simmonds, M.S.J & Paton, A.J. (2006). Plectranthus: A review of ethnobotanical uses. Journal of Ethnopharmacology, 103: 1-24
Selected Earlier Publications
- Kirkup, D., Malcolm, P., Christian, G. & Paton, A. (2005). Towards a digital African Flora. Taxon 54 (2): 457-466.
- Paton, A.J., Springate, D., Suddee, S. Otieno, D., Grayer, R.J., Harley, M.M., Willis, F., Simmonds, M.S.J., Powell, M.P., & Savolainen, V. (2004). Phylogeny and Evolution of Basils and Allies (Ocimeae, Labiatae) based on three Plastid DNA Regions. Molecular Phylogenetics and Evolution 31: 277-299.
- Suddee, S., Paton, A.J., & Parnell, J.A.N. (2004). A Taxonomic Revision of tribe Ocimeae Dumort. (Lamiaceae) in continental South East Asia. III. Ociminae. Kew Bulletin 60: 3-75.
- Willis, F., Moat, J. & Paton, A. (2003). Defining a role for herbarium data in Red List assessments: A case study of Plectranthus from East and Southern Tropical Africa. Biodiversity and Conservation 12: 1537-1552.
Paton, A., Harley, R.M. & Harley M.M. (1999) Ocimum - an overview of relationships and classification. In: Holm, Y. & Hiltunen, R. eds. Ocimum. Medicinal and Aromatic plants- industrial profiles.1-38. Series Ed. Hardman, Harwood Academic, Amsterdam.
