Plant Science Bulletin 60(1) 2014 Pamela Soltis and Douglas Soltis, University of Florida Pam and Doug Soltis are each accomplished scientists in their own right---and yet their names are often mentioned together for the combined research they have pursued over the years. They recently offered insights regarding their service in the BSA (including Pam’s 2007-2008 term as president and Doug’s 1999-2000 term) and their numerous contributions to the AJB dating back to the 1980s. Take us back to the early 1980s: Where were you, what were you doing, and what were you studying/most interested in at the time? Doug: I was in my second year as a faculty member at UNC Greensboro. At that time we were doing a lot of isozyme work (enzyme electrophoresis)— that was the hot molecular/genetic tool at the time. Things have come a long way. I was very interested in population genetics and breeding systems in flowering plants and also ferns. We also did a lot of chromosome banding, a cutting-edge cytogenetic technique of that time, which allowed us to look at chromosomal evolution, species relationships, etc.
Pam and Doug Soltis, 1988, during an AIBS conference in Davis, CA. In looking back over the course of your research, what areas have you consistently explored? What areas did you not expect to explore? Doug: We have consistently been interested in angiosperm relationships and polyploidy… the tools have changed. Some things have come full circle. Interesting to see that my first AJB paper (“Heterochromatin banding in Boykinia, Heuchera, Mitella, Sullivantia, Tiarella, and Tolmiea (Saxifragaceae)” [69(1): 108, 1982] was on chromosomes using what we then considered a sophisticated method (Giemsa banding) and my most recently accepted paper (“Natural hybrids between Tragopogon mirus and T. miscellus (Asteraceae): A new perspective on karyotypic changes following hybridization at the polyploid level” [100(10): 2016, 2013]) was on chromosomes using FISH and GISH, which are now the most powerful tools we have for examining chromosomes. Certainly, I never thought we would be doing floral evolutionary developmental genetics, transcriptomics or proteomics.
Pam: I was finishing graduate school, getting married to Doug, and moving to Washington from Kansas. I was interested in applying molecular (DNA) methods to questions of hybridization and polyploidy and had been exploring these approaches while a student. My first AJB paper (“An Intergeneric Hybrid in the Saxifragaceae: Evidence from Ribosomal RNA Genes” [72(9):1388, 1985]) was a test case for using rDNA for these sorts of questions. How has the thread of your research changed over time? Doug: The DNA revolution and now the informatics revolution have dramatically changed what we are able to do. When I started, we were not yet using DNA as a tool for examining relationships or population genetics. Now we are building massive phylogenetic trees using huge DNA data sets and conducting mega-analyses using large computer resources. Amazing.
Pam: I have long been interested in hybridization, introgression, and polyploidy, since my dissertation research, and these areas continue to be a major focus, with 25 years of work on Tragopogon polyploids. Although also having conducted phylogenetic analyses since my dissertation, I did not expect to become as deeply involved in angiosperm phylogenetics as I have. However, phylogeny is the framework for so much of what we do, and it therefore has been a very important part of my research over the years. I could not have
Pam: I still continue to collaborate with Doug on Saxifragales work occasionally, as one of our recent papers attests (“Phylogenetic relationships and character evolution analysis of Saxifragales using a supermatrix approach” [100(5):916, 2013]). Interestingly, much of my other research remains focused on hybridization and polyploidy, and the application of new molecular approaches to obtain more detailed views of reticulate evolution. 15