Lücking, born in
Ulm (southern Germany) in 1964, completed his
master's degree in 1990 and his PhD in biology in 1994, both at the
University of Ulm. Both of his degrees focused on the
taxonomy, ecology, and
biodiversity of
foliicolous lichens, which are lichens that live on the surface of leaves.[2] His graduate supervisor was the
mycologist and
bryologist Sieghard Winkler, who had previously studied epiphyllous (upper leaf-dwelling) fungi in El Salvador and Colombia.[3]
In 1996, Lücking was awarded the Mason E. Hale award for an "outstanding doctoral thesis presented by a candidate on a lichenological theme". His thesis was titled Foliikole Flechten und ihre Mikrohabitatpraferenzen in einem tropischen Regenwald in Costa Rica ("Foliicolous lichens and their microhabitat preferences in a tropical rainforest in Costa Rica"). In this work, Lücking recorded 177 foliicolous lichen species from the shrub layer in a Costa Rican
tropical forest.[4] Lücking later won the 2008 Augustin Pyramus de Candolle prize for a
monograph he published based on this work;[5] this award is given every four years by the
Société de Physique et d'Histoire naturelle de Genève [
fr] to "reward the author or -authors of the best monograph of a genus or family of plants".[6] In this 866-page work, Lücking compiled the revised nomenclature, description, ecology and distribution, and specimen information for 616 species and 15 infrageneric taxa.[7] The monograph, estimated to cover descriptions of approximately 70% of the world's known foliicolous lichens at that time, was favourably compared to and deemed a worthy successor of the seminal 1952 work on these lichens by
Rolf Santesson.[8] Following the publication of this monograph, he was described by the Austrian lichenologist Martin Grube as "today's leading expert on foliicolous lichens".[7]
After a short-term assignment as a visiting professor in
Recife, Brazil, he undertook a two-year
post-doctoral stint in Ulm to further study foliicolous lichens. Lücking earned his
habilitation from his studies (1998–2001) at the
University of Bayreuth, under the supervision of Gerhard Rambold. In 2001, he was hired as adjunct
curator at Chicago's
Field Museum of Natural History, and was later promoted to research collections manager for mycology.[2] Lücking and co-authors have twice been bestowed with the Tuckerman Award from the
American Bryological and Lichenological Society; this award is given to the most outstanding lichenological paper published each year in the scientific journal The Bryologist. The first (awarded in 2008) was for their publication about the
Gomphillaceae in eastern North America,[9] while the second (awarded in 2017) was the highly cited "2016 classification of lichenized fungi in the Ascomycota and Basidiomycota".[10] Since 1 July 2015, Lücking has been the curator of lichens, fungi, and bryophytes at the
Berlin Botanical Garden and Botanical Museum, overseeing the management, curation, and
digitisation of a
collection that encompasses approximately one million species.[11] Other research interests of his include
fungal evolution,
systematics, and
nomenclature.[12] He is a prolific author (or coauthor) of new fungal and lichen species, having
formally described about 1000 of them as of December 2017.[13]
Lücking was the lead author of a 2020 study that documented the discovery and potential extinction of a new species of lichen, Cora timucua, identified through
DNA analysis of museum specimens collected in
Florida between 1885 and 1985. The research highlighted the critical endangerment of C. timucua, possibly extinct due to
habitat loss, with its native pine
scrub habitat largely replaced by
urbanisation and agriculture. The study demonstrated the significance of digitised
museum collections in uncovering previously misidentified species and emphasises the need to conserve remaining habitats to protect undiscovered or poorly understood lichen diversity.[14]
Lücking is a highly published scientist, and has
formally described hundreds of fungal and lichen species new to science. A few of his major or highly cited works include:
Lücking, Robert; Buck, William R.; Plata, Eimy Rivas (2007). "The lichen family Gomphillaceae (Ostropales) in eastern North America, with notes on hyphophore development in Gomphillus and Gyalideopsis". The Bryologist. 110 (4): 622–672.
doi:
10.1639/0007-2745(2007)110[622:tlfgoi]2.0.co;2.
Rivas Plata, Eimy; Lücking, Robert; Lumbsch, H. Thorsten (2011). "A new classification for the family Graphidaceae (Ascomycota: Lecanoromycetes: Ostropales)". Fungal Diversity. 52 (1): 107–121.
doi:
10.1007/s13225-011-0135-8.
Lücking, Robert; Hodkinson, Brendan P.; Leavitt, Steven D. (2017). "The 2016 classification of lichenized fungi in the Ascomycota and Basidiomycota–Approaching one thousand genera". The Bryologist. 119 (4): 361–416.
doi:
10.1639/0007-2745-119.4.361.
JSTOR44250015.
^Lücking, Robert (2020). "Three challenges to contemporaneous taxonomy from a licheno-mycological perspective". Megataxa. 1 (1): 78–103 [85].
doi:
10.11646/megataxa.1.1.16.
^Joshi, S.; Upreti, D.K.; Hur, J.S. (2018). "Graphis lueckingiana, a new species from Cameroon". Korean Journal of Mycology. 46 (4): 491–494.
doi:
10.4489/KJM.20180053.
^Dal-Forno, Manuela; Eliasaro, Sionara (2009). "Four new species of Graphis (Ostropales: Graphidaceae) from Brazil". The Lichenologist. 42 (1): 77–81.
doi:
10.1017/s002428290999034x.
^Rodriguez-Flakus, P. (2018). "Palicella lueckingii (Lecanorales, Ascomycota), a new lichen species inhabiting Araucaria from the extratropical South America". Phytotaxa. 344 (1): 24–30.
doi:
10.11646/phytotaxa.344.1.3.