Mark Spencer is a British forensic botanist and botanical consultant. He also monitors the changing composition of London's plantlife. He is the honorary botany curator for the

Linnean Society of London The Linnean Society of London is a learned society dedicated to the study and dissemination of information concerning natural history, evolution, and taxonomy. It possesses several important biological specimen, manuscript and literature colle ...

Early life

Spencer was born in 1968. He became enthusiastic about plants as a child, especially plant identification and growth habits. He was brought up in the rural setting of

Warmington, Warwickshire Warmington is a village and civil parish in the Stratford-on-Avon district of Warwickshire, England. It is located on the border with Oxfordshire, around 5 miles (8 km) northwest of Banbury. The civil parish had, according to the 2001 Cen ...

and his family supported this interest. He disliked secondary school due to attacks and extensive bullying related to his strong opinions and homosexuality and left with few qualifications. In the 1990s, Spencer worked in bars in

Soho Soho is an area of the City of Westminster, part of the West End of London. Originally a fashionable district for the aristocracy, it has been one of the main entertainment districts in the capital since the 19th century. The area was develop ...

in London and was involved in HIV/AIDS activism around

Section 28 Section 28 or Clause 28While going through Parliament, the amendment was constantly relabelled with a variety of clause numbers as other amendments were added to or deleted from the Bill, but by the final version of the Bill, which received R ...

as well as the AIDS pandemic.

Botanical education and career

He took a BSc degree in botany at the University of Reading in his late 20s followed by a PhD specialising in Oomycete aquatic fungi supervised by Michael Dick. He subsequently worked in the

Natural History Museum, London The Natural History Museum in London is a museum that exhibits a vast range of specimens from various segments of natural history. It is one of three major museums on Exhibition Road in South Kensington, the others being the Science Museum an ...

as a research assistant and then botany curator. This led him to

plant taxonomy Plant taxonomy is the science that finds, identifies, describes, classifies, and names plants. It is one of the main branches of taxonomy (the science that finds, describes, classifies, and names living things). Plant taxonomy is closely allied ...

and systematics. Spencer is also involved in recording the natural history of the urban environment of London, especially the arrival of new species, often through the international horticultural trade. From around 2016, he has worked as a consultant forensic botanist. This started from a chance phone enquiry from the police. Spencer uses both field and laboratory methods to analyse features such as plant growth habit and microscopic fragments. He has found that observation of the growth of plants such as brambles ('' Rubus fruticosus'') can be very informative for estimating the time elapsed since a human body came to rest in woodland or hedgerows. Spencer is a Fellow of the

and honorary curator of the society's

herbarium A herbarium (plural: herbaria) is a collection of preserved plant specimens and associated data used for scientific study. The specimens may be whole plants or plant parts; these will usually be in dried form mounted on a sheet of paper (called ...

s. In March 2021, he was the guest on an episode of the

BBC Radio 4 BBC Radio 4 is a British national radio station owned and operated by the BBC that replaced the BBC Home Service in 1967. It broadcasts a wide variety of spoken-word programmes, including news, drama, comedy, science and history from the BBC' ...

programme ''

The Life Scientific ''The Life Scientific'' is a BBC Radio 4 science programme, presented by Professor Jim Al-Khalili , in which each episode is dedicated to the biography and work of one living scientist. The programme consists of an interview between Al-Khalili a ...

.''

Publications

Spencer is the author of the book ''Murder Most Florid: inside the mind of a forensic botanist'' published in 2019. He is also co-author of over 10 scientific publications including: * Chris A. Skilbeck, Iris Lynch, Maggie Ellenby, Mark A. Spencer (2019
Achene Morphology of British and Irish Mayweeds and Chamomiles: implications for taxonomy and identification
''British and Irish Botany'' 1 (2) 128-166 * Kenneth G. Johnson, Stephen J. Brooks, Phillip B. Fenberg, Adrian G. Glover, Karen E. James, Adrian M. Lister, Ellinor Michel, Mark Spencer, Jonathan A. Todd, Eugenia Valsami-Jones, Jeremy R. Young, John R. Stewart (2011
Climate Change and Biosphere Response: Unlocking the Collections Vault.
''BioScience'' 61 (2) 147-153 * Mark A. Spencer, Linda M. Irvine, Charles E. Jarvis (2009
Typification of Linnaean names relevant to algal nomenclature
''Taxon'' *MA Spencer, MC Vick, MW Dick (2002) Revision of ''Aplanopsis'', ''Pythiopsis'', and ‘subcentric’ ''Achlya'' species (Saprolegniaceae) using 18S rDNA and morphological data ''Mycological Research'' 106 (5) 549-560

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Spencer, Mark Living people British LGBT scientists British botanists British forensic scientists Alumni of the University of Reading People from Warwickshire Year of birth missing (living people)