Biologiske fag

With this volume in the series of publications from the Norwegian Academy of Science and Letters () we present the results of an international joint project: . The activities behind this publication have mainly taken place during the academic year 19981999 at the Centre of Advanced studies (CAS, - or SHS as the Norwegian acronym) in Oslo, organised by Reidar Elven and Inger Nordal. Two workshops, funded by CAS, have also been held at the Komarov Botanical Institute, of the Russian Academy of Sciences in St. Petersburg. The at CAS was initiated by an international symposium, 28. September to 3. October 1998, with about 30 participants. Section I in this volume includes the proceedings from this symposium. This section is subdivided into three subsections: A. General aspects, B. Taxonomic case studies, C. Information management. With the extant knowledge on the history, palaeogeography, evolution, and taxonomy of the Arctic, the editors wanted to be open to different views, and contrasting, even conflicting, views might be found. We still are in a phase where a complete synthesis is beyond the reach, so both theses and antitheses have been accepted in a good dialectic tradition. In addition to the presentations given at the symposium, two other relevant papers were included (Brochmann & Steen on genetic analyses of the Svalbard flora and Eriksen & Yurtsev on micromorphological indumentum classification within Potentilla). During the several workshops (or ) have been organised on critical genera/families with complicated taxonomy, obviously treated differently within Russian, Nordic, and/or American tradition. The reports from these workshops are presented in Section II, and include notes on Cerastillm, Dmba, Dr~as, Papaver, Poaceae, Potentilla, Salix, and Saxifmga. In some cases reasonable consensus has been obtained, as in Cerastiunl, Dmba, Papaver and Salix. In other groups there is still a way to go, as in Potentilla, Dryas, and grasses. An important task of the has been to revitalise the formal work on the , the history of which is presented by Murray and Yurtsev in the first contribution under Section I. Such a task needs heavy international organisation and two have been organised during this year, from 5. to 18. Oct. 1998 and from 31. May to 5. June 1999, to discuss organisation, structure and format of the PAF project. The results are presented in Section III. The following botanists have participated in one or both of these meetings: Susan Aiken (Canadian Museum of Nature, Ottawa), Arve Elvebakk (University of Tromsø), Reidar Elven (University of Oslo), Bengt Jonsell (The Royal Swedish Academy of Science/University of Stockholm), Hördur Kristinsson (University of Akureyri), David F. Murray (University of Fairbanks), Inger Nordal (University of Oslo), Vladislav V. Petrovsky (Komarov Botanical Institute, St. Petersburg), Vladimir Yu. Razzhivin (Komarov Botanical Institute, St. Petersburg), and Boris A. Yurtsev (Komarov Botanical Institute, St. Petersburg). Through intensive discussions, consensus was reached in the most important aspect, e.g. delimitation and zonal subdivision of the Arctic and the purpose and format of the Panarctic Checklist. An example of the presentation of the new, authoritative, annotated, PAF checklist is presented by genus Salix in this section. The future steering committee for the Panarctic Flora Project has been agreed upon: Aiken (Canada), Elven (Norway), Kristinsson (Iceland), Murray (Alaska), Yurtsev (Russia) - and hopefully a 6th person representing Greenland/Denmark. It is the hope of the editors that this book will inspire to the fulfillment, firstly of a complete consensus critical check list and secondly of a complete Panarctic Flora.Oslo/St.Petersburg November 1999. Inger Nordal.