Gretna Weste was a remarkable plant pathologist born to Australian parents in the United Kingdom (UK) during World War 1. She studied at the University of Melbourne and was employed in the Forests Commission of Victoria as a ‘temporary typist’ while investigating the preservation of timber logs burnt in the 1939 Black Friday bushfires. Weste returned to the School of Botany at the University of Melbourne briefly before raising a family. Once her children reached high school she returned to the School of Botany as a senior demonstrator, and enrolled as a PhD student part-time to study the cause of take-all disease of wheat. She was awarded a PhD in 1968. After take-all research was claimed by the Faculty of Agriculture in 1970, Gretna’s focus shifted to the newly discovered dieback disease affecting the forests of Western Australia and Victoria. Her research laid the foundations of our understanding of dieback disease, and underpinned the recognition of Phytophthora cinnamomi as a Key Threatening Process under the Australian Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act (1999). Dr Weste was awarded a DSc in 1983, appointed Member of the Order of Australia in 1989 for her significant service to plant pathology and became an Honorary Member of the Australasian Plant Pathology Society in 1992. Her distinguished career reflects a spirit and resilience that enabled her to overcome, or dodge, a series of gender-based obstacles in research, government and university hierarchies.

格雷特娜·韦斯特 (Gretna Weste) 是一位杰出的植物病理学家，父母是澳大利亚人，第一次世界大战期间出生在英国。她曾就读于墨尔本大学，并受聘于维多利亚州森林委员会，担任“临时打字员”，同时调查植物的保存情况。 1939 年黑色星期五丛林大火中燃烧的原木。在组建家庭之前，韦斯特曾短暂返回墨尔本大学植物学院。当她的孩子们上高中后，她作为一名高级示范员回到植物学院，并作为一名兼职博士生，研究小麦全病害的原因。她于 1968 年获得博士学位。1970 年农业学院宣布进行全面研究后，格雷特纳的注意力转向了新发现的影响西澳大利亚和维多利亚森林的顶枯病。她的研究奠定了我们对顶枯病的理解的基础，并支持了《澳大利亚环境保护和生物多样性保护法案》（1999 年）将肉桂疫霉视为主要威胁过程的认识。 Weste 博士于 1983 年获得理学硕士学位，因其对植物病理学的杰出贡献而于 1989 年被任命为澳大利亚勋章会员，并于 1992 年成为澳大利亚植物病理学学会荣誉会员。她杰出的职业生涯体现了一种精神和韧性，这使她能够克服或避免研究、政府和大学层级中一系列基于性别的障碍。