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PrefaceIn the spring of 1969 a small meeting was convened at the CSIRO Riverina Laboratory, Deniliquin, New South Wales, to discuss the biology of the genus Atriplex, a group of plants considered by those who attended to be of profound importance both in relation to range management in the region and as a tool in physiological research. The brief report of this meeting (Jones, 1970) now serves as a marker for the subsequent remarkable increase in research on this genus, and served then to interest the editors of the Ecological Studies Series in the present volume.This was an exciting time in plant physiology, particularly in the areas of ion absorption and photosynthesis, and unknowingly several laboratories were engaged in parallel studies of these processes using the genus Atriplex. It was also a time at which it seemed that numerical methods in plant ecology could be used to delineate significant processes in arid shrubland ecosystems. Nevertheless, to presume to illustrate and integrate plant physiology and ecology using examples from a single genus was to presume much. The deficiencies which became increasingly apparent during the preparation of the present book were responsible for much new research described in these pages.It was a happy coincidence that the authors had been exposed at times to the philosophies of pioneers in several areas of plant ecology; pioneers who themselves had experimented with members of the genus Atriplex. We have in mind of course the studies by Turesson in Scandinavia, of the genotypic response to habitat; the work of Hall and Clements at the Carnegie Institution on the phylogenetic approach to plant taxonomy; and the field and laboratory studies of Atriplex by Wood and by Beadle in Australia. It was a happy coincidence too, that the authors found themselves in the same laboratory in 1971-72.Since then we have depended a great deal on the support of our colleagues to build on these foundations and to bring the enterprise to its present form. Preeminent among these helpers have been Malcolm Nobs, whose advice we respect rather more than has been acknowledged in Chapter 2. We are particularly grateful for the stimulating collaboration over several years with Joe Ber...