Alpine plant research correspondence

• Reference:GB 248 UGC 198/4
• Dates of Creation:c1950s-1996
• Physical Description:
  0.15 metres

• Scope and Content

  Includes:

  • Correspondence relating to Pontecorvo's alpine research, c1950s-1990s;
  • Draft manuscript and correspondence between Pontecorvo and the Oxford University Press about research for his book on alpine plants, c1970s-1990s;
  • Notes and photographs relating to Pontecorvo's research on snow cover in the Swiss Alps, c1970-1996.

• Administrative / Biographical History

  Aside from genetics Pontecorvo's life long passion was alpine plant photography and ecology. He set aside each summer for pursuits to some of the world's most spectacular alpine regions, and his collection contains thousands of slides of alpine flowers and their habitats which he was using to research a book on plants at high altitudes (sadly this was never finished). He visited various mountains and national parks in the USA in the 1950s and 1960s, in the 1970s he travelled to Iran to study the flora of the Fars region and Mt Elburz. He explored the Himalayas in India and the Tien Shan and Kunlun mountains in China in the 1980s. These trips were organized with the help of The Royal Society or at the invitation of local academies and were often combined with lecture tours and courses. Ponte often made excursions to mountains a precondition for accepting invitations.

• Related Material

  GB 248 UGC 198/6 contains boxes of slides of alpine plants and flowers and their habitats, taken by Pontecorvo over a number of years in vatious locations around the world.

  GB 248 UGC 198/7 contains some of Pontecorvo's publications on apline plants and habitats

  GB 248 UGC 198/8 contains Pontecorvo's notes on lectures about alpine plants and habitats.