Timothy J. Baroni, a SUNY Cortland professor of biological sciences who has specialized in mycology, which is the study of fungi, was named a 2006 Fellow of the Mycological Society of America (MSA).
Baroni's recognition was announced during recent international joint meetings of the MSA and the Association for Plant Pathologists in Quebec City, Canada. His formal installment as an MSA Fellow will take place during the society's Annual Meeting July 29-Aug. 2 in Quebec City.
The MSA, an international organization, has bestowed this prestigious honor among its ranks since 2001. MSA Fellows are nominated as candidates without their knowledge from among members who have completed at least 11 years of service after earning a Ph.D. Honorees are selected for their solid record of mycological research, successful teaching and development of teaching materials for mycology, significant service to the society, or for a combination of those accomplishments.
Baroni was among four senior-level mycologists who received this coveted award in 2006. Others represented the New York Botanical Garden, the United States Department of Agriculture National Center for Agricultural Utilization Research in Peoria, Ill., and the University of Alabama.
A past MSA president, Baroni met the society's criteria in all three areas of strength, observed the sitting president, Professor James B. Anderson of the University of Toronto.
"This is richly deserved for your many contributions to mycology and for your dedication to the MSA over the years," Anderson asserted.
Baroni, who joined the MSA in 1974, was elected vice president in 1999 and fulfilled that role through 2000, subsequently serving a term as president elect. The following year, as the past president, he served on senior committees and in an advisory role. He served as treasurer from 1992-95. Baroni has chaired the society's Nomenclature, Smith Research Award, Finance, and Nominations Committees and was an associate editor to the society's journal, MYCOLOGIA, from 1997-2000.
Since 1980, Baroni has taught mycology at SUNY Cortland. His annual summer course in Field Mycology, started in 1983, is one of only a handful covering the study of macrofungi, or fleshy fungi, offered in the nation. Taught at the College's Outdoor Education Center at Raquette Lake, the course attracts college students internationally, working scientists from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and the Department of Agriculture, and an eclectic mix of physicians, artists and workers in fields ranging from landscape architecture to Wall Street investment.
Baroni's research work during the past 10 years has been supported by more than $905,000 in grants, mostly from the National Science Foundation (NSF). He has led two major NSF-funded biotic survey projects to examine the biodiversity of the macrofungi Basidiomycetes in selected regions in the Neotropics, including Puerto Rico, Jamaica, St. John U.S. Virgin Islands, the Dominican Republic and Belize.
The surveys on the census and discovery of new species involved a collaboration of 15-20 mycological colleagues from the U.S., Europe, Central and South America. To date, he and his colleagues, in separate or joint efforts, have published more than 50 research articles and two book chapters on their findings.
More recently, Baroni has traveled to Thailand and Tasmania to collect fungi and establish collaborative projects with researchers working in those areas. His efforts have already yielded three peer-reviewed, published articles on new species.
As an offshoot of his research efforts, over the past decade Baroni helped organize educational workshops. He secured funding for two teaching workshops in Puerto Rico and Venezuela on tropical fungi. Led by internationally known mycologists from the U.S., Europe and Central America, the workshop sponsors included the NSF, the Latin American Mycological Congress and several Venezuelan organizations. Participants came from countries in South America and Central America, Cuba and Mexico.
Baroni also organized two informal workshops on fungal identification and ecology in the Dominican Republic and Belize. Geared for foresters, guides for the ecotourism industries, local teachers and naturalists, the one-day workshops were provided to the local participants either at the beginning or end of scheduled research expeditions. As part of that effort, he distributed introductory identification guides on the common macro fungi of the particular country to selected agencies for their use.
