Grubb Reviews
In honour of Professor Grubb and his notable contributions to the advancement of plant ecology, Plant Ecology & Diversity introduced a permanent feature of the journal called the “Grubb Reviews” in 2015.
The Grubb Reviews are aimed to make substantial contributions to critical and analytical ecological thinking. They may go beyond general syntheses and contribute to debating ecological theory and the supporting or lacking evidence base that empirical studies provide for such theory.
Peter Grubb studied Natural Sciences at Cambridge University in 1954-57, specializing in Botany. He worked for his PhD as a plant physiologist, but expeditions to what is now Kosovo in 1956 and 1959, to Colombia in 1957 and Ecuador in 1960, plus a sabbatical in Australia in 1963 led to his conversion from physiologist to ecologist. In 1961 he was appointed a University Demonstrator at Cambridge, then in 1964 Lecturer, and later Reader and Professor. His physiological interest was balanced by a penchant for natural history and a keenness to see ‘what the plants are telling you’. Under the influence of A S Watt, he was increasingly concerned with community dynamics. He and his students carried out their research mostly in tropical rain forests or in chalk grasslands in England, but he also worked on several other vegetation-types. He has been interested chiefly in the bigger issues such as maintenance of species-richness, determination of relative abundance, the role of nutrient supply, the interpretation of leaf form, and the generalizations that can or cannot be made about such plant features as seed size, the magnitude and type of investment in defence, and the kinds of competition found in different types of vegetation. His Presidential Address to the British Ecological Society in 1990 was dedicated to the theme ‘A positive distrust in simplicity’, and his research became increasingly aimed at correcting the paradigm.
Edited by
Dr Víctor Resco de Dios(University of Lleida, Spain)