Per Magnus Jørgensen

Jørgensen was born in Stavanger, Norway, in 1944. He obtained his Candidatus realium from the University of Bergen in 1969. In 1978, he earned a PhD from Uppsala University, with a dissertation titled "The lichen family Pannariaceae in Europe". He was a student of prominent lichenologist Rolf Santesson;[1] Gunnar Degelius was another early mentor.[2] A few years after receiving his doctorate, he was appointed Professor of Systematic Botany at the University of Bergen. He was known for delivering his university lectures with great enthusiasm, and for helping to popularize botany in Norway.[3] As of 2020, he is a Professor Emeritus at the University of Bergen.[4]

Jørgensen is a member of the Norwegian Academy of Sciences. He has more than 200 publications dealing with the systematics, floristics, biogeography, and nomenclature of lichens;[1] in these papers he described about 300 taxa new to science.[5] A specialist of the family Pannariaceae, he has also written about several other families in the third volume of the Nordic Lichen Flora. More recently, he has published several works about the history of lichenology. Jørgensen is a connoisseur of the plant genus Rhododendron and maintains a large collection of these plants in the Bergen botanical garden.[1] He was editor of the popular science magazine Naturen from 1991 to 1997.[4]

Lichen taxa named in honour of Jørgensen include the species Stigmidium joergensenii R.Sant. (1989),[6] Leptogium joergensenii Marcelli & Kitaura (2014),[7] and the genus Joergensenia Passo, S.Stenroos & Calvelo (2008).[8]

• Jørgensen, Per M. (1978). The Lichen Family Pannariaceae in Europe. Opera Botanica. 45. Stockholm: Swedish Natural Science Research Council. pp. 1–123.
• Jørgensen, Per M.; James, Peter W.; Jarvis, Charles E. (1994). "Linnaean lichen names and their typification". Botanical Journal of the Linnean Society. 115 (4): 261–405. doi:10.1111/j.1095-8339.1994.tb01784.x.
• Jørgensen, Per M. (2001). "Great discoveries in bryology and lichenology: Th. M. Fries (1832–1913), great Scandinavian lichenologist". The Bryologist. 104 (4): 537–542. doi:10.1639/0007-2745(2001)104[0537:TMFAGS]2.0.CO;2. JSTOR 3244587.
• Jørgensen, Per M. (2002). Conspectus familiae Pannariaceae (Ascomycetes lichenosae) (PDF). Ilicifolia. 4. Bergen: Botanisk institutt, Universitetet i Bergen. pp. 1–78. ISBN 82-7460-014-2.
• Jørgensen, Per M. (2007). "History of lichenology in Norway up to 1973". Bibliotheca Lichenologica. 95: 41–61.
• Jørgensen, Per M., ed. (2007). Botanikkens historie i Norge [History of Botany in Norway] (in Norwegian). Bergen: Fagbokforlaget Vignostad & Bjoeke AS. ISBN 978-82-450-04991.
• Jørgensen, Per M. (2017). "The development of lichenology in the history of botany". The Bryologist. 120 (1): 37–44. doi:10.1639/0007-2745-120.1.037. S2CID 90626078.