R.W.G. Dennis
| Richard William George Dennis | |
|---|---|
| Born |
13 July 1910 Thornbury, Gloucestershire |
| Died | 7 June 2003 (aged 92) |
| Residence | UK |
| Nationality | British |
| Fields | Mycology |
| Institutions | Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew |
| Known for | Contributions to taxonomic mycology and plant pathology |
| Author abbrev. (botany) | Dennis |
Richard William George Dennis, Ph.D. (13 July 1910 – 7 June 2003), was an English mycologist and plant pathologist.
Dennis was born in Thornbury, Gloucestershire, the son of a schoolmaster. He was educated at Thornbury Grammar School and Bristol University, where he studied geology and botany, writing a thesis on canker disease of willow. In 1930, he obtained a post in the Plant Husbandry Department of the West of Scotland Agricultural College in Glasgow, where he studied diseases of oats. This became the subject of his PhD from Glasgow University in 1934.
In 1939, Dr Dennis secured a post as Assistant Plant Pathologist at the Department of Agriculture, Edinburgh. He returned to England in 1944 and became assistant to Elsie Maud Wakefield, head of mycology at the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew. On her retirement in 1951, R.W.G. Dennis took over her position and remained at Kew till his own retirement in 1975.
His early publications reflected his work as a plant pathologist, but at Kew he developed an interest and expertise in fungal taxonomy, with particular reference to the Ascomycetes. His research resulted in a series of papers, culminating in the publication of British cup fungi and their allies in 1960, subsequently revised and expanded as British Ascomycetes. He also undertook a checklist of the British Basidiomycetes with agaricologist A.A. Pearson, published in 1948. A new and much revised, critical checklist, with P. D. Orton and F. B. Hora, followed in 1960.
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