Dr Christine Cargill

I fell in love with mosses in my third year of university while completing a third year botany project on Wyperfeld National Park in north-western Victoria.

This love affair continued into my botany honours year (1978) when I worked on the spectacular moss Hypnodendron in the Dandenong Ranges near Melbourne. Following my degree, I was very fortunate to obtain work as a research assistant to the well-known Australian bryologist Dr George A. M. Scott at Monash University, changing direction from mosses to liverworts. I later turned my attention to the hornworts after receiving a grant to revise the group for Australia.

In 1997, I travelled with my family to the United States to complete a PhD at Southern Illinois University at Carbondale, under the supervision of well-known hepaticologists Drs B J Crandall-Stotler and R E Stotler. After completing my postgraduate degree in 2001 I returned to Australia, and obtained the position of Curator of the Cryptogam Herbarium.

Through the use of light and electron microscopy together with both classical taxonomic and molecular techniques, I am continuing my studies on the systematics and biology of liverworts and hornworts of Australasia. More recently, after obtaining a grant, I have also begun work on the biology and cultivation of a rare North Queensland epiphytic fern, Revwattsia fragilis .