{"id":487212,"date":"2023-08-15T16:40:07","date_gmt":"2023-08-15T19:40:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/revistapesquisa.fapesp.br\/?p=487212"},"modified":"2023-08-16T09:10:23","modified_gmt":"2023-08-16T12:10:23","slug":"the-grande-dame-of-botany","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/revistapesquisa.fapesp.br\/en\/the-grande-dame-of-botany\/","title":{"rendered":"The grande dame of botany"},"content":{"rendered":"

Graziela Maciel Barroso (1912\u20132003) was a central figure in the construction of Brazilian botany. \u201cShe was an example of how it is possible to do research with lots of pleasure, lots of satisfaction, instilling the joy of discovery in us,\u201d says Jos\u00e9 Rubens Pirani, from the Department of Botany of the University of S\u00e3o Paulo (USP), who met her in the early 1980s. With the students often preferring the flashiest and biggest flowers, she insisted: \u201cEven the smallest flower has admirable characteristics. Place it under the magnifying glass and you’ll see how wonderful it is.<\/p>\n

From Corumb\u00e1, in the state of Mato Grosso do Sul, Barroso was known as the “grande dame of botany,” having trained hundreds of researchers on graduate programs at universities in Rio de Janeiro, Recife, Campinas, and Bras\u00edlia. As a researcher for the Botanical Garden of Rio de Janeiro (JBRJ), she identified 11 new genera and 132 new species of plants, especially in families of her specialty, such as Asteraceae, which includes the sunflower, the daisy, and the lettuce, and Myrtaceae, which includes the guava, the pitanga, and the jabuticaba.<\/p>\n

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JBRJ\u2009\/\u2009Arquivo Graziela Maciel Barroso<\/span>At the UnB campus in 1967JBRJ\u2009\/\u2009Arquivo Graziela Maciel Barroso<\/span><\/p><\/div>\n

\u201cThroughout her career, identifying a plant was a much more arduous task than today, because it was necessary to do a lot of bibliographical research in libraries and herbariums,\u201d explains botanist Marcelo da Costa Souza, coordinator of the Botanical Garden of the Federal Rural University of Rio de Janeiro (UFFRJ) In recent years, access to digital collections from Brazil and other countries has made this work incomparably quicker.<\/p>\n

She also published 65 scientific articles and wrote essential books for teaching and researching the systematics \u2014 or classification \u2014 of plants. One of her works, Sistem\u00e1tica de angiospermas do Brasil<\/em> (Livros T\u00e9cnicos e Cient\u00edficos\/Edusp), which translates as \u201cSystematics of angiosperms from Brazil,\u201d was published in three volumes between 1978 and 1986, and became an international reference.<\/p>\n

Even with compulsory retirement, in 1982, she did not stop researching, teaching, and advising students. In 1999, aged 87, she published another book Frutos e sementes: Morfologia aplicada \u00e0 sistem\u00e1tica de dicotiled\u00f4neas<\/em> (Fruits and seeds: morphology applied to the systematics of dicotyledons; Editora UFV), coauthored by Marli Pires Morim and Carmen L\u00facia Ichaso, of JBRJ, and Ariane Luna Peixoto, of UFRRJ. The herbariums for which she identified plants helped to map species threatened by extinction and to preserve the areas in which they were found.<\/p>\n

With the students
\n<\/strong>\u201cShe was the greatest trainer of human resources in the field in Brazil in the twentieth century,\u201d states Morim. Barroso was “Mrs. Graziela” for many, or “Aunt Graziela” for the more affectionate students. The familiar expression shows the nature of the more than just technical and scientific training that she gave the students.<\/p>\n

Peixoto, who did a PhD under her guidance, says that Barroso did not separate research advice from life advice for her students. \u201cMrs. Graziela had a holistic view of student training. She saw research as part of life, without disassociating the professional dimension from the family and personal ones.\u201d<\/p>\n

Souza remembers that she did not present him to colleagues as “my student” or “my advisee.\u201d It was \u201cmy son.\u201d She advised him as she approached 90 years of age. \u201cEven with so much experience, she was humble and perceived that she always had to keep on studying,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n

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JBRJ\u2009\/\u2009Arquivo Graziela Maciel Barroso<\/span>An expedition to the South of Brazil to collect plants in 1964JBRJ\u2009\/\u2009Arquivo Graziela Maciel Barroso<\/span><\/p><\/div>\n

The nurturing of her students could slip into a maternal feeling, but she was still demanding. Morim always remembers the day when she told her: “An advisor is not a nanny.\u201d<\/p>\n

Barroso nurtured the students\u2019 commitment to the work and inspired them to research. \u201cYou have the holy fire of research,\u201d she told Pirani, a beginner at the time, after watching one of the first seminars by the young botanist during his graduate course at USP at the start of the 1980s. Pirani says that Barroso conveyed her affection and fascination of the studied material to her students.<\/p>\n

Her devotion to botany, evident in the classrooms and herbariums, overflowed on field trips. Peixoto was with her in Goi\u00e1s when they finally found a species they were looking for, Deianira nervosa<\/em>, a shrub with pink flowers. \u201cMrs. Graziela bent down, looked, and said a mixture of poetry and prayer in which she described with emotion the parts of the plant, the sunlight, and the sky itself, ending in a kind of thank you,\u201d she recalls. Pirani adds: \u201cShe spoke and wrote in the most poetic manner, with a romantic streak, something stifled among us scientists, due to the demand for objectivity in the description of plants.\u201d<\/p>\n

Barroso could only dedicate herself to botany from the age of 30. She married agronomist Liberato Joaquim Barroso (1900\u20131949) when she was 16 and had two children: Mirtila, who became an artist, and Manfredo, who was an airplane pilot.<\/p>\n

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JBRJ\u2009\/\u2009Arquivo Graziela Maciel Barroso<\/span>Recognition upon receiving a commemorative medal for the 150th<\/sup> anniversary of the Rio de Janeiro Botanical Garden, in 1958JBRJ\u2009\/\u2009Arquivo Graziela Maciel Barroso<\/span><\/p><\/div>\n

With her children in their adolescence, she decided to study botany, encouraged by her husband, her first and greatest teacher in the area, in her own opinion. Liberato worked in the Botanical Garden of Rio de Janeiro and she became an intern there. Some years later, in 1946, she was the first woman to take the public competition for research in the institution. She came in second place.<\/p>\n

Barroso continued to study systematic botany in the Botanical Garden until her husband died, when she was 37 years old. Even without formal training in the area, she advised students and interns at the institution. \u201cShe said she suffered discrimination for being a woman. They said her place was in the home, not researching,\u201d says Souza.<\/p>\n

At 47 years of age, she entered university. Soon after, in 1960, Manfredo died when the Varig DC-3 of which he was the commander crashed during an unsuccessful takeoff. Despite being devastated by the loss of her son, she graduated in biology from the old State University of Guanabara, currently State University of Rio de Janeiro (UERJ).<\/p>\n

Already recognized as a researcher and educator, she obtained her PhD at the age of 61, from the University of Campinas (UNICAMP), in 1973. Prior to this, she had advised students and set up the Botany Department of the University of Bras\u00edlia (UnB).<\/p>\n

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mbzFund\u2009\/\u2009FLICKR | Krzysztof Ziarnek, Kenraiz\u2009\/\u2009Wikimedia Commons<\/span>Two species named in her honor: Aspilia grazielae<\/em>, of the sunflower family (left<\/em>), and Philodendron grazielae<\/em>, a rare and perennial vine (right<\/em>)mbzFund\u2009\/\u2009FLICKR | Krzysztof Ziarnek, Kenraiz\u2009\/\u2009Wikimedia Commons<\/span><\/p><\/div>\n

From 1966 to 1969, as a teacher at UnB, she witnessed the persecution of teachers by the military government. In August 1968, soldiers invaded the university and arrested students and employers. \u201cShe used to say that she grabbed a national flag and hugged some students, trying to protect them during the invasion. Afterwards, she went to visit the students in jail,\u201d affirms Morim.<\/p>\n

Barroso wrote letters to the dean of the university and the President of the Republic appealing for the students to be released. She also protested against the summary dismissal of teachers. Later, she warned about the deforestation caused by the construction of the Trans-Amazonian Highway. Seen by the government as a communist and an adversary of the regime, she was prevented from entering the Botanical Garden of Rio de Janeiro for three months, in 1974, when then-President Ernesto Geisel (1907\u20131996) occupied one of the buildings as a residence.<\/p>\n

\u201cMrs. Graziela was nonpartisan, but firm in the exercise of citizenship,\u201d clarifies Morim. British botanist Simon Mayo, of the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew, in London, highlighted Barroso’s strength in a testimony recorded in 2012: \u201cShe had courage to stand up for herself, even when it was really difficult to defend science. Very quiet and friendly, inside she was steel.\u201d<\/p>\n

After UnB, Barroso returned to the JBRJ, worked with the systematics, morphology, and taxonomy (classification) of plants, becoming one of the greatest specialists of plant species in the country. She taught courses on graduate programs at UNICAMP, the Federal University of Pernambuco, and the National Museum at the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro (UFRJ), among others. She was consulted by researchers across the country to help in the identification and cataloging of species.<\/p>\n

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JBRJ\u2009\/\u2009Arquivo Graziela Maciel Barroso<\/span>In 1997, aged 80, on a carnival float of the Unidos da Tijuca School of Samba at the Rio de Janeiro carnival paradeJBRJ\u2009\/\u2009Arquivo Graziela Maciel Barroso<\/span><\/p><\/div>\n

In her honor, her botany colleagues named four genera and 83 species of plants, such as the trees caiapi\u00e1-da-cana (Dorstenia grazielae<\/em>), maria-preta (Diatenopteryx grazielae<\/em>), and pata-de-vaca (Bauhinia grazielae<\/em>) described by former students or colleagues from other countries. In 1999, she was awarded with one of the greatest honors in the field, the Millennium Botany Award, offered by the International Botanical Congress, in the USA.<\/p>\n

At nearly 90 years of age, she still visited the Botanical Garden in Rio once or twice a week. She began losing her eyesight. \u201cI would help her see the plants in the microscope and would describe what she was observing,\u201d says Souza, the last botanist she advised. \u201cMarcelo became Mrs. Graziela’s eyes and was very important in this final moment of hers,\u201d assesses ecologist Luis Fernando Tavares de Menezes, of the Federal University of Esp\u00edrito Santo (UFES), who was the one who introduced her to Souza. \u201cShe would get very distressed at not being able to see the details of the plants.\u201d<\/p>\n

Barroso died at 91 years of age, after being elected to the Brazilian Academy of Sciences (she was never sworn in). Just before, she was hospitalized with lung problems. Peixoto visited her and left the hospital with a message for Souza: \u201cMrs. Graziela said not to forget to identify the material that is under the bench.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"An advisor to students even before she studied biology, Graziela Barroso described 132 new species of plants","protected":false},"author":630,"featured_media":487213,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_active":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_note":"","_exactmetrics_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[152],"tags":[206,209,213],"coauthors":[1647],"class_list":["post-487212","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-retrospect","tag-biodiversity","tag-biology","tag-botany"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/revistapesquisa.fapesp.br\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/487212","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/revistapesquisa.fapesp.br\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/revistapesquisa.fapesp.br\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/revistapesquisa.fapesp.br\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/630"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/revistapesquisa.fapesp.br\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=487212"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/revistapesquisa.fapesp.br\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/487212\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":489526,"href":"https:\/\/revistapesquisa.fapesp.br\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/487212\/revisions\/489526"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/revistapesquisa.fapesp.br\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/487213"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/revistapesquisa.fapesp.br\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=487212"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/revistapesquisa.fapesp.br\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=487212"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/revistapesquisa.fapesp.br\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=487212"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/revistapesquisa.fapesp.br\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=487212"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}