John Birks

Harry John Betteley Birks (John) is a botanist and emeritus professor at the University of Bergen and University College London.

He is best known for his work on the development of quantitative techniques in Quaternary palaeoecology.

He has researched the vegetational and environmental history over the past 10–20,000 years in many parts of the world, including Fennoscandia, UK, Minnesota, the Yukon, Siberia, and Tibet.

Birks was born on 12 January 1945 in Malvern, UK.

He was educated at Glasgow Academy and Latymer Upper School, London (1949–1958) and at Manchester Grammar School (1958–1963).

He was a Taylor Scholar in Natural Sciences at Sidney Sussex College, Cambridge (1963–1966) and read the Natural Science Part I (Botany, Zoology, Geology, Biochemistry) and Part II (Botany) Tripos.

He was awarded the Frank Smart Prize (1965) and Studentship (1966) in Botany.

Together they have explored arctic or alpine floras on all continents except Antarctica since 1965 and have a large collection of plant images taken on these expeditions.

Birks married Hilary Helen Lees in 1966 and they have one child, Christopher (born 1972).

Hilary is also a botanist and Quaternary scientist.

He was elected a Research Fellow (1967–1971) and Fellow (1971–1984) of Sidney Sussex College.

He completed his PhD thesis on “The Late-Weichselian and Present Vegetation of the Isle of Skye” at the University of Cambridge in 1969.

He was a post-doctoral research fellow at the Limnological Research Center, University of Minnesota (1970–71, 1982) working with Herb Wright.

He was appointed Assistant in Research, Sub-department of Quaternary Research, University of Cambridge 1971, Senior Assistant in Research in 1973, and University Lecturer in Botany 1975.

He served as a College Lecturer in Natural Sciences (1971 – 1984) and Tutor for Graduate Students (1977 – 1983) at Sidney Sussex.

In 1984 he moved to the Botanical Institute (now Department of Biological Sciences), University of Bergen and was Professor of Quantitative Ecology and Palaeoecology until he retired in 2015.

He was also ENSIS Professor of Quantitative Palaeoecology in the Environmental Change Research Centre, University College London 1993–2010.

On retirement, he became Professor Emeritus in the Department of Biological Sciences, University of Bergen and Visiting Professor Emeritus at the Environmental Change Research Centre, University College London

Birks held short-term visiting academic positions in Minnesota, Fairbanks, Kingston (Ontario), Toronto, Lund, Umeå, Abisko, Krakow, Utrecht, Bern, Innsbruck, and Oxford.

Birks studied Quaternary pollen analysis, vegetational history, and plant ecology.

He developed and applied numerical approaches in Quaternary pollen analysis with Allan D. Gordon and in palaeolimnology, notably in acid-rain research with Cajo ter Braak and climate reconstructions.

Contemporary botanical research has been in community ecology, plant geography, and bryology.

He has authored or edited 26 books and over 590 papers or book chapters

His principal mentors have been Harry Godwin, Frank Oldfield, Herb Wright, Ed Cushing, Derek Ratcliffe, and Michael Proctor.

He has supervised over 35 doctoral students and over 30 master students and mentored more than 60 research visitors.

He has taught botanical and numerical analytical topics within palaeoecology and ecology at the undergraduate and graduate levels

In 2015, The Holocene published a Special Issue in honour of Birks entitled ‘At the frontiers of palaeoecology’ edited by Richard W. Battarbee, Anne E. Bjune, and Kathy J. Willis.