Chellapilla Venkata Rao (1910–1971) was an Indian

botanist Botany, also called , plant biology or phytology, is the science of plant life and a branch of biology. A botanist, plant scientist or phytologist is a scientist who specialises in this field. The term "botany" comes from the Ancient Greek wo ...

Education

He was awarded his PhD from the

University of Tasmania The University of Tasmania (UTAS) is a public research university, primarily located in Tasmania, Australia. Founded in 1890, it is Australia's fourth oldest university. Christ College, one of the university's residential colleges, first pro ...

in 1957 with a thesis entitled ''Cytotaxonomic studies in the Proteaceae''.

Academic appointments

He worked in the Department of Botany, Andhra University, Waltair, from 1948 to 1967. During this period he worked for three years on the

Palmaceae The Arecaceae is a family of perennial flowering plants in the monocot order Arecales. Their growth form can be climbers, shrubs, tree-like and stemless plants, all commonly known as palms. Those having a tree-like form are called palm trees. ...

as a senior post-doctoral fellow of the National Institute of Science of India. From 1955 to 1957, under the

Colombo plan The Colombo Plan is a regional intergovernmental organization that began operations on 1 July 1951. The organization was conceived at an international conference, The Commonwealth Conference on Foreign Affairs held in Colombo, Ceylon (now Sri L ...

as a post-doctoral research scholar working with H.N. Barber at the University of Tasmania, he received a PhD (in addition to his earlier D.Sc. from

Andhra University Andhra University (IAST: ''Āndhra Vișvakalāpariṣhat'') is a public university located in Visakhapatnam, Andhra Pradesh, India. It was established in 1926. History King Vikram Deo Verma, the Maharaja of Jeypore was one of the biggest do ...

– for work on Malvaceae). From 1967 until his death in 1971, he was head of the department of botany, Andhra University Postgraduate Centre,

Guntur Guntur () is a city and the administrative headquarters of Guntur district in the Indian state of Andhra Pradesh. Guntur is spread across 168.49 km square and is the third-largest city in the state. It is situated to the west of the Ba ...

, India, where he both taught and wrote.

Research interests

A major interest was the family

Proteaceae The Proteaceae form a family of flowering plants predominantly distributed in the Southern Hemisphere. The family comprises 83 genera with about 1,660 known species. Together with the Platanaceae and Nelumbonaceae, they make up the order Pro ...

, and in 1971, CSIR published his

monograph A monograph is a specialist work of writing (in contrast to reference works) or exhibition on a single subject or an aspect of a subject, often by a single author or artist, and usually on a scholarly subject. In library cataloging, ''monograph ...

on the family. The monograph was said by J.P.Rourke of the

Compton Herbarium Kirstenbosch is an important botanical garden nestled at the eastern foot of Table Mountain in Cape Town. The garden is one of 10 National Botanical Gardens covering five of South Africa's six different biomes and administered by the South Af ...

, himself a specialist in Proteaceae, to be

a broad survey of the whole family on the basis of the anatomy and morphology of the leaves, stems, inflorescences, flowers, and fruits of representative species from most of the living genera. Embryological features are treated in detail and accounts of the cytology and fossil records are also provided....As the leading researcher on this family, Venkata Rao has, not unnaturally, drawn heavily on his own work but has nevertheless succeeded in dealing with the literature as a whole in a comprehensive manner.

A second reviewer, Ronald Melville (of

Kew Gardens Kew Gardens is a botanical garden, botanic garden in southwest London that houses the "largest and most diverse botany, botanical and mycology, mycological collections in the world". Founded in 1840, from the exotic garden at Kew Park, its li ...

), disagreed with Rao's phylogenetic and evolutionary conclusions but thought that many would be grateful to Venkata Rao "for bringing together in one volume such a detailed, comparative account of the vegetative and floral morphology and anatomy, the cytology and embryology, which will make it a valuable work of reference for a long time to come." Within the

, he authored the tribes, Macadamieae and Lambertieae (

basionym In the scientific name of organisms, basionym or basyonym means the original name on which a new name is based; the author citation of the new name should include the authors of the basionym in parentheses. The term "basionym" is used in both botan ...

of Lambertiinae) (both now subsumed into the

Grevilleoideae The Grevilleoideae are a subfamily of the plant family Proteaceae. Mainly restricted to the Southern Hemisphere, it contains around 46 genera and about 950 species. Genera include ''Banksia'', ''Grevillea'', and ''Macadamia''. Description The ...

). He also worked on other families, in particular, the

Sterculiaceae Sterculiaceae was a family of flowering plant based on the genus ''Sterculia''. Genera formerly included in Sterculiaceae are now placed in the family Malvaceae, in the subfamilies: Byttnerioideae, Dombeyoideae, Helicteroideae and Sterculioideae. A ...

Malvaceae Malvaceae, or the mallows, is a family of flowering plants estimated to contain 244 genera with 4225 known species. Well-known members of economic importance include okra, cotton, cacao and durian. There are also some genera containing familiar ...

and

Bombacaceae Bombacaceae were long recognised as a family of flowering plants or Angiospermae. The family name was based on the type genus ''Bombax''. As is true for many botanical names, circumscription and status of the taxon has varied with taxonomic point ...

(now subsumed in an enlarged

), and also

Euphorbiaceae Euphorbiaceae, the spurge family, is a large family of flowering plants. In English, they are also commonly called euphorbias, which is also the name of a genus in the family. Most spurges, such as ''Euphorbia paralias'', are herbs, but some, e ...

Elaeocarpaceae Elaeaocarpaceae is a family of flowering plants. The family contains approximately 615 species of trees and shrubs in 12 genera."Elaeocarpaceae" In: Klaus Kubitzki (ed.). ''The Families and Genera of Vascular Plants'' vol. VI. Springer-Verlag: Be ...

and

Apocynaceae Apocynaceae (from ''Apocynum'', Greek for "dog-away") is a family of flowering plants that includes trees, shrubs, herbs, stem succulents, and vines, commonly known as the dogbane family, because some taxa were used as dog poison Members of the ...

. His work centred on

plant anatomy Plant anatomy or phytotomy is the general term for the study of the internal structure of plants. Originally it included plant morphology, the description of the physical form and external structure of plants, but since the mid-20th century plant ...

morphology Morphology, from the Greek and meaning "study of shape", may refer to: Disciplines *Morphology (archaeology), study of the shapes or forms of artifacts *Morphology (astronomy), study of the shape of astronomical objects such as nebulae, galaxies, ...

and embryology and also involved other families.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Rao, Chellapilla Venkata 1910 births 1971 deaths 20th-century Indian botanists University of Tasmania alumni