David Taylor PhD

Dr. David Taylor is a professor in the Department of Biology at the University of Portland, where he teaches courses such as Organismal and Population Biology, Field Botany, the Nature of Plants (an introduction to plant evolution and ecology), and Plants as Food and Medicine. Dr. Taylor earned his undergraduate degrees in Biology (B.S.) and Spanish (B.A.) at the University of Connecticut, and his Masters and Ph.D. degrees at the University of Michigan. He previously taught at Kalamazoo College, Northwestern University, and Chicago Botanic Garden before happily arriving at the University of Portland. Dr. Taylor’s research projects have focused on plant evolution and classification, ethnobotany (the study of how human cultural groups use plants for food, medicine, construction, and other purposes), plant alpine ecology, and plant reproductive biology. He has carried out most of his research field work in the Caribbean (Cuba, the Dominican Republic, and Puerto Rico), Central America (Costa Rica, Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua, and Panama), Mexico, New Caledonia, and Taiwan, which in part has him to recognize and name a new genus (group of species) in the large tropical family that includes coffee and gardenias. Dr. Taylor’s research is now mostly focused on plant sexual systems and plant-pollinator interactions in the coffee family in Taiwan and the acerola family in New Caledonia. When Dr. Taylor is not teaching or in the field botanizing, he enjoys hiking and all manner of dancing, especially Swing and Lindy Hop.