Gene banks pay big dividends to agriculture, the environment, and human welfare

Abstract

Nearly a century after the pioneering American apple tree purveyor Johnny Appleseed traveled from town to town planting nurseries in the Midwestern United States, Frans Nicholas Meijer left his Netherlands home to pursue a similar vocation as an "agricultural explorer" for the US Department of Agriculture. Over the course of his career, Meijer, who changed his name to Frank Meyer after reaching the New World, helped introduce over 2,500 foreign plants from Europe, Russia, and China, including the lemon that would bear his name. Starting with his first expedition for Asian plants in 1905, Meyer would encounter isolation, physical discomfort, disease, robbers, and revolutionaries in his quest to collect useful plants.

Citation

Johnson, R. C. 2008. Gene banks pay big dividends to agriculture, the environment, and human welfare. Public Library of Science (PLoS) Biology. 6(6): 1152-1155.