Lester
Burgess, Fellow 1998
Lester was only the third person to be made a fellow of the Australasian
Plant Pathology Society and this honour was a fitting reward for his
contributions to, not only the field of plant pathology, but also to APPS.
During his working career Lester managed to fill most of the positions on the
APPS Executive most recently as President during 2001-2003 and was instrumental
in the establishment of the APPS Newsletter, the precursor to Australasian Plant
Pathology. Lester is also a fellow of the American Phytopathological Society.
Most of Lester’s career was spent at the
University
of
Sydney
, initially as an undergraduate and postgraduate student and then as a member of
academic staff. In between this he had several post-doctoral positions in the
US
. He was awarded a personal chair in Applied Mycology in 2000 and retired from
“formal” employment in July of this year. He does of course remain very
active in research and teaching despite having retired. At various points in his
career he also held adjunct positions at
Pennsylvania
State
University
and
Kansas
State
University
.
A large proportion of Lester’s scientific work has focused on the
diseases caused by Fusarium species, especially crown rot of wheat caused
by Fusarium pseudograminearum. To date he has written over 100 scientific
papers, a number of book chapters and several books, mostly on Fusarium.
He has also described a number of new species of Fusarium, was one of the
few researchers internationally interested in the ecology and biology of the
genus and worked to understand the methods for controlling diseases caused by Fusarium.
He has been recognized for two decades as one of the authorities on Fusarium
which has resulted in a multitude of
requests for guidance and advice and a number of international research
collaborations.
The other component of his work which will leave a lasting legacy is his
role as a mentor of students (both formally and informally) and other
researchers. His list of students who did projects and degrees under his
supervision is one of both quantity and quality and his infectious enthusiasm
for plant pathology was responsible for many students choosing to study plant
pathology and mycology. His recent work in
Vietnam
and
Indonesia
has had an enormous impact on plant pathology in those countries greatly
enhancing the capacity of those countries and enabling a number of researchers
to deal with the variety of plant pathological problems they face in those
environments.
An APPS Symposium day was held recently at the Botanic Gardens
Trust to celebrate Lester’s career and featured talks by a number of
Lester’s former students and post-docs, emphasising the impact that he has
had. While Lester has now formally retired no-one really expects him to slow
down too much, maybe some time for fishing now and then, and we can expect many
additional achievements to be added to those above!
Brett Summerell, Botanic Gardens Trust
December 2006
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