The dispersion of air-borne spores

Is gene dispersion normal?

“…The following types of gene dispersion have thus been shown to be leptokurtic: automatic movement of airborne insects Wright, 1943, 1947 ;Bateman, 1947 and present paper) ; water fleas (Brownlee,191 x) ; passive moVement of airborne organisms (Gregory, 1945;Bateman, 1947) ; dispersal of pollen by insects (Bateman, 1947). There remain a number of important types of gene dispersion for which the necessary information is not yet available the movement of terrestrial animals and birds ; the movement of plankton; and the dispersal of seeds by explosive and other automatic mechanisms.…”

“…The explanation of the leptokurtosis produced by wind dispersal is to be found in a theoretical discussion of the subject in which the problem is treated as an example in aerodynamics (Gregory, 1945) and is discussed in terms of atmospheric turbulence or eddy diffusion.…”

Aerial distribution of the root-rot fungus Fomes annosus (Fr.) Cooke in Finland

“…The development, dispersal and deposition of viable diaspores is affected by numerous weather elements (e.g., HIRST 1953, GREGORY 1961, SHRUM and WOOD 1967, INGOLD 1968.…”

Spores in Air

“…Hitler's war was threatening, and as it proved I was lucky to have three years to finish the experiment in the Isles of Scilly with the constant help of Gordon W. Gibson. But I expressed my doubts (9,12): too diffidently as it proved (such was the prevailing enthusiasm for small plots) and made no impact until the point was taken up by J. E. Vanderplank (27), though Joyce and Roberts, working with cotton pests in the Sudan, had reached similar conclusions drawing attention to "interfer ence" between experimental plots (23). Few workers on foliage diseases have explic itly investigated the bias introduced into their experiments by unwanted movement of inoculum or spray between small adjacent plots, until the current work by James and co-workers at Ottawa (19a) and by Bainbridge & Jenkyn (I) at Rothamsted.…”