Balick has worked in ethnobotany and ethnomedicine in remote areas of the tropics with people of indigenous cultures, as well as in New York City with people having traditional herbal knowledge[7] from China and the Caribbean.[9] From 1974 to 1975 he lived in Costa Rica and helped build the Wilson Botanical Garden at the Las Cruces Biological Station. From 1975 to 1997 he was a frequent researcher in Amazonia, where he studied palms and their local uses. He has done research and taught university courses in "ethnobotany and ethnomedicine, phytochemistry, floristics and conservation biology."[7]
Balick is the author or co-author of more than 160 scientific articles or book chapters. He is also the author, co-author, editor, or co-editor of thirty books and monographs, varied among scientific and general interest.[1] He has been a co-collector with more than two dozen botanists, including Brian M. Boom, Andrew J. Henderson, and Ghillean Prance.[7] Balick has been doing research with Gregory M. Plunkett on the plants and ethnobotany of Vanuatu's Tafea Province.[1]
Among his academic and professional honors, Balick was elected in 1999 a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS)[11] and in 2004 received the AAAS International Award for Scientific Cooperation. In 2018 he received the David Fairchild Medal for Plant Exploration of the National Tropical Botanical Garden and in 2020 the H. Marc Cathey Award for outstanding scientific research that has enriched horticulture and plant science from the American Horticultural Society. He is a founding member of the Daylight Academy, a scientific academy based in Zurich, Switzerland. For the academic year 2005-2006 he was a Guggenheim Fellow. He was the president of the Society for Economic Botany in 1992 and in 2009 was a recipient of the Society's Distinguished Economic Botanist award.[7]
In 2024, he joined The Daylight Award jury, selecting Daylight in Architecture and Daylight Research laureates.
He is married to Emily Lewis Penn, a New York City realtor and poet.
Selected publications
Articles
Balick, Michael J. (1984). "Ethnobotany of Palms in the Neotropics". Advances in Economic Botany. 1: 9–23. JSTOR43931365.
Sheldon, Jennie Wood; Balick, Michael J.; Laird, Sarah A.; Milne, George M. (1997). "Medicinal Plants: Can Utilization and Conservation Coexist?". Advances in Economic Botany. 12: i–104. JSTOR43931401.
Slish, Donald F.; Ueda, Hiroko; Arvigo, Rosita; Balick, Michael J. (1999). "Ethnobotany in the search for vasoactive herbal medicines". Journal of Ethnopharmacology. 66 (2): 159–165. doi:10.1016/S0378-8741(98)00225-6. PMID10433472.
Balick, Michael J.; Kronenberg, Fredi; Ososki, Andreana L.; Reiff, Marian; Fugh-Berman, Adriane; Bonnie, O'Connor; Roble, Maria; Lohr, Patricia; Atha, Daniel (2000). "Medicinal plants used by latino healers for women's health conditions in New York City". Economic Botany. 54 (3): 344–357. doi:10.1007/BF02864786. S2CID33839980.
Sosa, S.; Balick, M.J.; Arvigo, R.; Esposito, R.G.; Pizza, C.; Altinier, G.; Tubaro, Aurelia (2002). "Screening of the topical anti-inflammatory activity of some Central American plants". Journal of Ethnopharmacology. 81 (2): 211–215. doi:10.1016/S0378-8741(02)00080-6. PMID12065153.
Camporese, A.; Balick, M.J.; Arvigo, R.; Esposito, R.G.; Morsellino, N.; Simone, F.De; Tubaro, A. (2003). "Screening of anti-bacterial activity of medicinal plants from Belize (Central America)". Journal of Ethnopharmacology. 87 (1): 103–107. doi:10.1016/S0378-8741(03)00115-6. PMID12787962.
Prance, G. T.; Balick, M. J., eds. (1990). New directions in the study of plants and people: research contributions from the Institute of Economic Botany. Advances in Economic Botany 8. The New York Botanical Garden. ISBN0-89327-347-3.[12]
Dahmer, S.; Balick, Michael J.; Hillmann-Kitalong, Ann, et al. (2018). Palau Primary Health Care Manual: Health Care in Palau, Combining Conventional Treatments and Traditional Uses of Plants for Health and Healing. The New York Botanical Garden, Ministry of Health, Republic of Palau, Belau National Museum. ISBN9781477446355
Nelson, L.S.; Balick, Michael J. (2020). Handbook of Poisonous and Injurious Plants, Third Edition. Springer Science and Business Media, New York Botanical Garden. ISBN9781493989249.
Balick, Michael J.; Hillmann-Kitalong, Ann (2020). Ethnobotany of Palau: Plants, People and Island Culture, Volume 1. Belau National Museum/The New York Botanical Garden. ISBN9798685012555.
Balick, Michael J.; Hillmann-Kitalong, Ann (2020). Ethnobotany of Palau: Plants, People and Island Culture, Volume 2. Belau National Museum/The New York Botanical Garden. ISBN9798685017864.
Balick, Michael J.; Cox, Paul Alan (2020) Plants, People and Culture: The Science of Ethnobotany, 2nd Edition. Taylor and Francis Group/CRC Press. ISBN9780815345909.
^"Lawrence Memorial Award"(PDF). Bulletin of the Hunt Institute for Botanical Documentation. 1 (2): 2. Fall 1979.
^ abMarderosian, Ara der (1996). "Review of Plants, People, and Culture: The Science of Ethnobotany by Michael J. Balick and Paul Alan Cox". The Quarterly Review of Biology. 71 (4): 572. doi:10.1086/419583.
^ abKnelman, Fred H. (2000). "Reviewed work: Plants, People and Culture: The Science of Ethnobotany, Michael J. Balick, Paul Alan Cox". Peace Research. 32 (1): 92–94. JSTOR23607689.
^Schultes, Richard Evans (1993). "Review of The Subsidy from Nature by Anthony B. Anderson, Peter H. May & Michael J. Balick". Environmental Conservation. 20 (2): 187. doi:10.1017/S037689290003798X. S2CID227288087.