Thomas Robert Soderstrom

American botanist (1936-1987).

Thomas Robert Soderstrom (9 January 1936 Chicago – 1 September 1987) was an American agrostologist. His special field of study was the grass family Gramineae or Poaceae. He was Curator of Grasses at the National Museum of Natural History in Washington, DC for some twenty years. In 1957 Soderstrom graduated from the University of Illinois with a BSc in Biology, and enrolled at the graduate school at Yale University, earning a Master of Science in Biology the following year and a PhD in Botany 1961. He joined the National Museum in 1960 as assistant curator. He became an authority on the taxo