Molecular Systematics of Bryophytes: Progress, Problems and Perspectives, was an internationally attended symposium held at the Missouri Botanical Garden, September 6 and 7, 2003. Attendees from a dozen countries, representing a global bryological community, participated in the event. The symposium program featured twenty-nine speakers discussing various aspects of the molecular systematics of bryophytes (mosses, liverworts, and hornworts). The result of this gathering of imminent botanical researchers is the book now before you, twenty-one chapters divided into five areas of concentration: (1) Bryophytes and Evolution of Land Plants; (2) Hornwort Phylogeny; (3) Liverwort Phylogeny; (4) Moss Phylogeny; and (5) Phylogeography.