Alan W. Meerow is an American botanist, born in New York City in 1952. He specializes in the taxonomy of the family Amaryllidaceae and the horticulture of palms and tropical ornamental plants. He also works on the population genetics and molecular systematics of cycads and palms.
He studied at the Bronx High School of Science and then at the University of New York. Dropping out after a year, aged 19, he moved to Santa Cruz, California. After living on a farm for four years he decided to resume his studies in botany and horticulture at the University of California.
Initially his interest in botany was focused on trees, working for three years in the arboretum of the University. He graduated in December 1978 and continued his postgraduate study at the University of Florida, after working for two years at the Marie Selby Botanical Gardens in Sarasota, Florida, where his interest in Amaryllidaceae was stimulated. His master's thesis, in 1983, was on the taxonomy of the genus Eucharis. He continued with the same subject in his doctoral studies, producing his thesis entitled "A Monograph of Eucharis and Caliphruria (Amaryllidaceae)" in 1986.
He then moved to the University of Florida's Fort Lauderdale Research and Education Center where he was a palm and tropical ornamental specialist. As well as carrying out research on the phylogeny and taxonomy of the Amaryllidaceae, he bred Hippeastrum and other ornamental species. In 1998 the International Bulb Society awarded him the Herbert Medal in recognition of his contributions to the knowledge of bulbous plants.
Since 1999, he has been located at the National Germplasm Repository of the United States Department of Agriculture/Agricultural Research Service (USDA-ARS), based in Miami, working on the conservation, genetics, systematics, characterization, and breeding of species of subtropical and tropical ornamentals. In 2005, the American Society of Plant Taxonomists awarded him the Peter Raven Award for Scientific Outreach.
Meerow has published over 150 scientific papers, numerous magazine and university extension articles, and is the author or co-author of three popular books on palms.
Meerow, Alan W (1986). A monograph of Eucharis and Caliphruria (Amaryllidaceae) (Ph. D. Thesis). University of Florida.
Meerow, AW; Snijman, DA. Amaryllidaceae. pp. 83–110. doi:10.1007/978-3-662-03533-7_11. , in Kubitzki (1998). (additional excerpts)
Meerow, Alan W.; Fay, Michael F.; Chase, Mark W.; Guy, Charles L.; Li, Qin-Bao; Snijman, Deirdre; Yang, Si-Lin (2000). Phylogeny of Amaryllidaceae: Molecules and morphology. pp. 372–386. ISBN 9780643099296. Retrieved 25 January 2015. , in Wilson & Morrison (2000)
García, Nicolás; Meerow, Alan W.; Soltis, Douglas E.; Soltis, Pamela S. (1 March 2014). "Testing Deep Reticulate Evolution in Amaryllidaceae Tribe Hippeastreae (Asparagales) with ITS and Chloroplast Sequence Data". Systematic Botany. 39 (1): 75–89. doi:10.1600/036364414X678099.
Meerow, A.W.; Fay, M.F.; Guy, C.L.; Li, Q.-B.; Zaman, F.Q.; Chase, M.W. (1999). "Systematics of Amaryllidaceae based on cladistic analysis of plastid rbcL and trnL-F sequence data". Am. J. Bot. 86 (9): 1325–1345. JSTOR 2656780. PMID 10487820. doi:10.2307/2656780.
Meerow, A.W.; Guy, C.L.; Li, Q.-B.; Yang, S.-L. (2000). "Phylogeny of the American Amaryllidaceae Based on nrDNA ITS Sequences" (PDF). Systematic Botany. 25 (4): 708–726. doi:10.2307/2666729. Retrieved 25 January 2015.
Meerow, Alan W.; Snijman, Deirdre A. (December 2001). "Phylogeny of Amaryllidaceae Tribe Amaryllideae Based on nrDNA ITS Sequences and Morphology". American Journal of Botany. 88 (12): 2321–2330. doi:10.2307/3558392.
Meerow, Alan W.; Guy, Charles L.; Li, Qin-Bao; Clayton, Jason R. (2002). "Phylogeny of the Tribe Hymenocallideae (Amaryllidaceae) Based on Morphology and Molecular Characters". Annals of the Missouri Botanical Garden. 89 (3): 400–413. JSTOR 3298600. doi:10.2307/3298600.
Meerow, Alan W.; van der Werff, Henk (1 July 2004). "Pucara (Amaryllidaceae) Reduced to Synonymy with Stenomesson on the Basis of Nuclear and Plastid DNA Spacer Sequences, and a New Related Species of Stenomesson" (PDF). Systematic Botany. 29 (3): 511–517. doi:10.1600/0363644041744400.
Meerow, AW; Francisco-Ortega, J; Schnell, RJ (2006). "Phylogenetic relationships and biogeography within the Eurasian clade of Amaryllidaceae based on plastid ndhF and nrDNA ITS sequences: lineage sorting in a reticulate area?". Systematic Botany. 31 (1): 42–60. JSTOR 25064128. doi:10.1600/036364406775971787. Full text
Meerow, Alan W.; Snijman, Deirdre A. (2006). "The never-ending story: multigene approaches to the phylogeny of Amaryllidaceae". Aliso. 22: 355–366. Retrieved 25 January 2015.
Meerow, Alan W.; Reveal, James L.; Snijman, Deirdre A.; Dutilh, Julie H. (November 2007). "(1793) Proposal to conserve the name Amaryllidaceae against Alliaceae, a "superconservation" proposal". Taxon. 56 (4): 1299–1300. doi:10.2307/25065925. Retrieved 28 January 2015.
Meerow, Alan. Towards a phylogeny of the Amaryllidaceae. pp. 169–179. , in Rudall et al. (1995)
