At its annual meeting this summer in Chiang Mai, Thailand, the Society for Economic Botany honored Memory Elvin-Lewis, Ph.D., adjunct professor of Microbiology and Ethnobotany at the School of Medicine; and Walter H. Lewis, Ph.D., professor emeritus of biology in Arts & Sciences “in recognition of outstanding achievement, research, and service to the field of economic botany.”
This was the first time that two scientists have been simultaneously honored by the society. Elvin-Lewis is professor of biomedicine in microbiology and ethnobotany and has been at the University since 1967. Lewis, professor emeritus of biology and senior botanist at the Missouri Botanical Garden, has been associated with both institutions since 1964. Their research focusing on medical and dental botany has spanned more than three decades, largely in Amazonia and West Africa. Both remain active in the Society and Lewis served as resident in 1990. The 1,000-member Society for Economic Botany founded in New York nearly 50 years ago and international in scope is “devoted to past, present, and future uses of plants by people.”
For more information, go online to the society’s Web page- http://128.121.194.34/_news_/index.php?sm=02