Rediscovering Lucky Hill: SEM-EDS insights into the composition and weathering of a Jamaican meteorite

A 2020 external review of science at the Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History (NMNH) noted that increased investment in informatics was a key element for becoming a modern knowledge institution. This review charged NMNH with developing and implementing a comprehensive strategy for the future of the museum’s informatics program including reorganization, innovation, and new approaches to staffing to address urgent needs in data science and informatics capacity. After completing assessments of current capacity and needs and the role of NMNH informatics within the global biodiversity informatics landscape, the informatics task force found that robust community building, both internally and externally, would be critical to an expanded vision of informatics at NMNH. Approaches for local and global community strategies across an organization, like NMNH and its people, go hand in hand. Solidifying a strong foundation locally is often necessary for enabling robust, coordinated participation and resource sharing at the global level. Although the task force's primary focus has been internal community building to support the increasing need for local informatics capacity, much of that internal work is closely aligned with and often driven by external participation and networks. It is also clear that many organizations are contending with similar challenges, highlighting the importance of sharing strategies and lessons learned through peer-to-peer discussions and knowledge sharing. Based on the results of the task force’s surveys, interviews and research, the new NMNH model will be anchored on the development of a community of practice. This model extends knowledge and strengthens communication and coordination with departments, programs, and collaborators both within the Smithsonian and globally. It focuses on expanding capacity through improved knowledge sharing, cross training and more strategic application of resources and tasking, hopefully resulting in a robust, innovative environment. Here we open discussions on the importance of community for increasing capacity in support of the expanding natural history informatics landscape and strategies for the future at many levels. We highlight findings from efforts of the NMNH task force to explore what successful, supported informatics capacity looks like and initial proposed plans for revitalizing the NMNH informatics program.

The National Museum of Natural History is committed to long-term stewardship of collections and to supporting their use by scientists and the general public. This stewardship role is unique among other US natural history museums. As the nation’s natural history museum, the National Museum of Natural History has a mandated commitment to conserve and protect its collections in a manner that will assure their continued accessibility by future generations and maintain the National Museum of Natural History mission. A significant number of objects from the National Museum of Natural History are permanently stored at the Museum Support Center in Suitland, MD. This space not only includes collections from the National Museum of Natural History (NMNH), but also the Museum Conservation Institute (MCI), the National Museum of American History (NMAH), the Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden (HMSG), the Freer Sackler Gallery (FSG) and the National Museum of African Art (AfA) as well as several other museums. In terms of collections access and use, the museum support center has a team, Collections Support Services (CSS), dedicated to collections’ long-term care and preservation. Collections Support Services provides access and support for the 730,000 square feet of collections housed at MSC. CSS staff perform a variety of technical and labor tasks related to the cleaning, preparation, packing, transport, unpacking, and permanent storage of objects and specimens. This includes building custom aluminum pallets for oversized objects and whale skull cradles. Moreover, while the use of palletized storage is not a new concept in museum storage, the construction of Pod 4 at the Museum Support Center in Suitland, MD posed some unique challenges for the permanent storage of oversized collections. Pod 4 provides continuous rows of 2', 4' and 8' deep cantilevered open racking from floor to ceiling (22 feet high), and allows palletized objects to be moved and placed in the racking via forklift. Traditional wooden pallets are unacceptable by archival standards, as they are acidic by nature, bulky, heavy, not fire-retardant, and prone to pest infestation. Collections Support Services circumvented these issues by establishing an innovative system of customized aluminum pallets for collections’ long-term care and preservation. These pallets are durable and lightweight, and must pass several quality control tests that include dropping and jarring. They are also designed with multiple functions in mind for ease of use, storage, transport, and maintenance.

The collections of Cryptophagidae beetles stored in the natural museums of Ukraine were studied: three academic and two university collections – State Museum of Natural History, National Museum of Natural History and I.I. Schmalhausen Institute of Zoology of the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine, Zoological Museum of T. Shevchenko Kyiv National University and Museum of Natural History of V. Karazin Kharkiv National University, and also author’s work collection. The volumes and the state of their preservation have been analyzed. The representation of different species in collections, as a whole, and in relation to the Carpathian fauna is evaluated. In general, museum collections contain 1346 samples of Cryptophagids, in each of which – about 210-340 individuals, all of them are stored in separate boxes and punctured by entomologic needles. The author's collection includes 1657 specimens of 57 species, which are mostly stored on cotton mattresses. All six collections include 122 species of 16 genera, containing from 21 to 85 species of this family. Some samples in collections have been lost for various reasons, in 10 cases there are only needles with labels without the samples themselves, therefore, some species (eg Cryptophagus nitidulus, C. hexagonalis) are represented in collections conditionally, only in labels. At the revision of materials attention is paid to taxonomic changes, through which in the publications and in the actual material different species or generic synonymic names were used. The author also took into account the uniqueness of each of the collections, which was determined by several important parameters, including the number of samples that are presented exclusively in some of the museum of species and genera of the family, the number of samples and type specimens in collection. For most of these parameters the leader is the collection of Zoological Museum of T. Shevchenko Kyiv National University. All data is included in the author's database, which contains summaries of annotations containing collections of samples, names of regions and localities of collection, dates, collectors, or owners of the collection, and also notes with clarifications of places or details of reidentifications.

The Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History (NMNH) Department of Paleobiology (Paleo) is the steward of the world’s largest fossil collection. The collection is made of 40 million objects housed in 11,000 cases plus 2,600 square meters in oversized housing, all spread over four separate facilities. The collection contains fossil representatives of the entire history of life. The Smithsonian has been accessioning fossils since the late 1880s, and the collection is actively growing through field research of museum scientists as well as through the acquisition of sizeable orphaned collections. The collection database (Axiell EMu) contains about 660,000 specimen catalog records of the estimated 14,000,000 records required to digitally database the entire collection. NMNH Paleo strives to care for and manage the collection in a way that meets the highest standards for collections accessibility and accountability. Our collections management priorities are: ensuring the collections are physically preserved, housed, and arranged to ensure long-term preservation and accessibility; making the collections holdings and associated data digitally discoverable and accessible through Smithsonian data-management systems and global data-sharing utilities; establishing and implementing best-practice systems for managing research-quality specimen data and data-lifecycle management; implementing sustainable workflows for mass-digitization specimen databasing, 2D and 3D imaging, georeferencing, and transcription of relevant collections labels and analog records; requiring all registration activities including acquisitions, loans, borrows, disposals, shipments, permits, and repository agreements meet the highest ethical and legal standards for documentation; leveraging our professional expertise in collections management to train students and avocational collectors in fossil collections care; and to actively collaborate with paleobiologists and other museum researchers and stakeholders to advance the discipline of paleobiology and collections-based research. Addressing these priorities at the scale of the NMNH Paleo collection requires a deliberate strategy and disciplined project management, especially given that staff and resources are limited. The NMNH and the overarching Smithsonian organizational structure use several museum- and institution-wide metrics and reporting systems for evaluating the collections against its strategic goals. Within NMNH Paleo, these metrics are applied to and enhanced by projects that address the priorities listed above. The projects presented here were developed as part of a strategy to meet departmental, museum, and institutional goals. They are integrated across the department and include surveys, assessments, and the development of data standards and workflows. The success of the projects is most dependent on strong communication and teamwork among the department staff.

The Education and Outreach (E&O) Collection at the Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History (NMNH) contains around 125,000 specimens and objects representing all seven of NMNH’s research departments: Anthropology, Botany, Entomology, Invertebrate Zoology, Mineral Sciences, Paleobiology, and Vertebrate Zoology. The primary source of the E&O Collection is the NMNH’s former Naturalist Center (NC) that began in 1976 and closed in 2011. Almost a year after the NC’s closure, the Collection was repurposed as the core of the E&O Collection for the new science learning center, Q?rius, at NMNH. The E&O Collection was designated a collecting unit that needed to meet the Smithsonian Institution’s standards of care, holding non-accessioned collections to the same principles as accessioned collections. For museums to claim full legal title, all acquired collections require proof of offer from the donor, acceptance by the museum, and physical custody of the objects. Title status is necessary to comply with the exceptions and regulations surrounding intellectual property rights and to fulfill legal and ethical obligations. E&O collection items derived from several different sources, including donations, purchases, exchanges, collecting trips, and most commonly from former NC docents who routinely deposited items into the Collection. At the start of 2013, the E&O Collection’s team along with graduate-level interns from The George Washington University began the legal title project for the E&O Collection. In order to ensure that NMNH holds full title to the E&O Collection, interns research original acquisition records and federal and international regulations on cultural and biological materials. In 2016, through the Collections Care Preservation Fund, a contractor was hired to: 1) create a comprehensive digital and paper record to re-enforce the integrity of the non-accessioned collections and their future actions for exhibition, loan, or disposal, and 2) conduct thorough research and review of collection items’ acquisition histories to record that NMNH has done its due diligence to understand what is in the E&O Collection and how it arrived there. Over the past five years, we have investigated legal title for over 9,000 collection lots and worked with over 44 interns. We have digitized over 1,097 transaction records and have linked over 20,090 catalog records to a transaction. Ultimately, the E&O legal title research process ensures collection items have full legal title, mitigates risk of losing collection data by digitizing acquisition records and legal title research, and promotes best practices for acquired but not accessioned education collections.

Previous articleNext article No AccessZoologyNarwhal: Revealing an Arctic Legend. Edited by William W. Fitzhugh and Martin T. Nweeia. Hanover (New Hampshire): IPI Press and Washington (DC): Arctic Studies Center, National Museum of Natural History (Smithsonian Institution); distributed by the University Press of New England, Lebanon (New Hampshire). $35.00. xxviii + 233 p.; ill.; index. ISBN: 978-0-9967480-1-8. [This book is the companion to the exhibit Narwhal: Revealing an Arctic Legend at the Smithsonian Institution’s National Museum of Natural History.] 2017.PDFPDF PLUS Add to favoritesDownload CitationTrack CitationsPermissionsReprints Share onFacebookTwitterLinkedInRedditEmail SectionsMoreDetailsFiguresReferencesCited by The Quarterly Review of Biology Volume 94, Number 3September 2019 Published in association with Stony Brook University Article DOIhttps://doi.org/10.1086/705062 Views: 10Total views on this site For permission to reuse, please contact [email protected]PDF download Crossref reports no articles citing this article.

The study was designed to analyze the curatorial professional resources of natural history museums in Korea and propose a plan on how to develop human resources including younger generation of experts to be working on the future National Museum of Natural History. Many academic associations and expert groups in the field have been making multilateral efforts along with research-based studies about how to best establish a National Museum of Natural History in the past 20 years. The Korean Earth Science Society was a premier organization which has been working closely on the establishment of natural history museums and science museums through a number of academic studies and projects more than any other academic associations. This study recommends that the future National Museum of Natural History needs highly-trained specialists of museums. Therefore, the Korean Earth Science Society has to offer multiple courses that produce specialists in various fields of museums through education and training.

Pacific island land snail faunas are among the most threatened faunas in the world, having suffered a higher rate of extinction than any other major animal group. The Hawaiian land snails are among the most species-rich and most severely effected of these faunas, yet the current status of most of the Hawaiian species is unknown. Most of the major taxonomic studies on the fauna were undertaken 50–100 years ago and only certain groups were comprehensively studied. New research is uncovering undescribed species, both extant and extinct. The need for rigorous taxonomic treatment of the group is acute if the taxonomic and conservation status of the many species is to be ascertained, and the basis for such research is comprehensive study of type material. The Smithsonian's National Museum of Natural History holds type material of 39 nominal species-group taxa of Hawaiian land snails belonging to eight families; this annotated catalog provides details of this material. Of these taxa, 29 were described by Augustus Addison Gould from material collected by the U.S. Exploring Expedition of 1838–1842. For completeness, we also provide details for one lot of purported paralectotypes that are here inferred not to have been syntypes and one lot representing an unavailable infrasubspecific name. We designate lectotypes for 12 species-group taxa . Yeung, Norine W., Robert H. Cowie, Kenneth A. Hayes, and Ellen E. Strong. Type Specimens of Hawaiian Land Snails in the Smithsonian Institution, National Museum of Natural History, with Lectotype Designations. Smithsonian Contributions to Zoology, number 647 , vi + 34 pages, 11 figures, 2017.

Crowning Achievements: African Arts of Dressing the Head

This article is dedicated to the distinguished Ukrainian scientist Mykola Vasylovych Sharleman (1887–1970), who worked as a research associate at the Zoological Museum of the All-Ukrainian Academy of Sciences from 1921 to 1934 and held managerial positions at this institution in 1934(33)–1937 and 1941–1943. The long-standing scientific contributions of M. V. Sharleman provided the foundation for a collection that covers various regions of Ukraine and offers a valuable resource for analysing changes in the species composition and distribution of birds across Ukraine over the past century. A key milestone in this study was the discovery of the First Inventory Book of the collection from 1919, along with historical journals revised approximately in 1948–1949 that served as the collection’s catalogue. These unique documents proved to be vital in researching the history of acquisitions for the collections of the National Museum of Natural History of the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine. Between 1907 and 1939, as well as in 1943, M. V. Sharleman donated 538 bird skins to the museum, representing 130 species of 13 orders. The most abundant specimens represented the species Calidris alpina (51 specimens), Phylomachus pugnax (28), Motacilla flava (26), and Dendrocopos major (19). Additionally, rare bird species listed in the Red Book of Ukraine were also present in the collection, such as Asio flammeus (2), Anarhynchus alexandrinus (1), Charadrius hiaticula (8), Columba oenas (1), Dendrocopos leucotos (4), Falco naumanni (2), Glareola nordmanni (2), Haematopus ostralegus (1), Lanius excubitor (2), Limosa limosa (2), Milvus migrans (1), Monticola saxatilis (1), Numenius arquata (2), Recurvirostra avosetta (2), and Sternula albifrons (3). The primary objective of this work is to study and promote the unique ornithological collection of the National Museum of Natural History (NMNH), which is the largest in Ukraine, encompassing over 40 000 specimens of 950 bird species. In addition to the scientific collection, which comprises bird skins (36 528 storage units) and egg clutches (2 998 units), there is also an impressive exhibition consisting of 1449 units. With its broad scale and scientific importance, this assemblage serves as a unique resource for biodiversity research. The ornithological collection holds not only scientific and cultural significance but also stands as a testament of dedication to the scientists whose meticulous work ensured its formation.

The various forms of cooperation between the National Museum of Natural History in Sofia and the Regional Museum of Natural History in Plovdiv are presented in the various areas of museum work (creation and curation of museum collections, exhibitions, scientific popularization, scientific research activities) from the establishment of the Regional Museum of Natural History in Plovdiv (1955) to 2025. The importance of this museum in the development and education of ecologically literate and nature conservation-educated citizens of modern Bulgarian society is highlighted.

Female biting midges of the subgenera Microhelea Kieffer, Pterobosca Macfie, and Trichohelea Goetghebuer of the genus Forcipomyia Meigen feed on the hemolymph of arthropod hosts, as do some species of the closely related genus Atrichopogon Kieffer. Arthropod hosts include Opiliones (Lane, 1947), Araneae (Clastrier and Legrand, 1991), Odonata (Macfie, 1932; Wirth, 1956a; Clastrier and Legrand, 1990), Phasmida (Wirth, 1971; Clastrier and Wirth, 1995), Orthoptera (Wirth and Castner, 1990; Perez-Gelabert and Grogan, 1999), Hemiptera (J. Reid, pers. comm. fide [Lane, 1977]; Clastrier and Del?colle, 1997), Neuroptera (Tokunaga and Murachi, 1959; Wirth, 1956a, 1966), Megaloptera (Wirth, 1956a), Cole?ptera (Wirth, 1956b, 1980), Diptera (Wirth, 1956a), Hymenoptera (Wirth, 1956a), and Lepidoptera (e.g., Wirth, 1956a, 1972; Lane 1977, 1984). At least four records of Forcipomyia species feeding from the wings of Geometridae exist: F. {Trichohelea) tonnoiri (Goetghebuer), which was reported from two geometrids, Ectropis crepuscularia (Denis and Schifferm?ller) and Alcis bastelbergeri Hirschke (previously Boarmia repandata L.) in Switzerland (Edwards, 1925); an unidentified species said to be near F. (Synthyridomyia) murina (Winnertz), discovered on the wing of Perizoma didymata (L.) in Denmark (Kryger, 1914); and Forcipomyia (Trichohelea) pec?nunguis (de Meijere) on Cleora immemorata (Walker) in New Caledonia (Clastrier and Del?colle, 1991). We report new records for F. (T.) pec?nunguis on Geometridae and a significant extension of the known geographical range of this ectoparasitic midge. Taxonomy for ectoparasites and hosts follows Borkent and Wirth (1997), and Scoble (1999), respectively. Forcipomyia (T.) pec?nunguis is known from the Caroline Islands (Tokunaga, 1940), Mariana Islands (Tokunaga and Murachi, 1959), New Caledonia (Clastrier and Del?colle, 1991), Samoa (Wirth, 1956a), Sumatra (de Meijere, 1923; Macfie, 1934), New Guinea and Australia (Debenham, 1987), and Viti Levu, Fiji (two female specimens examined in the collection of the National Museum of Natural History, Museum Support Center, Suitland, Maryland). Hosts noted in publications are moths in the families Arctiidae, Crambidae, Geometridae, Noctuidae, and Sphingidae. We report F. (T.) pec?nunguis from Malaysia and Taiwan feeding on seven geometrid species, summarized in Table 1. Four hosts with attached midges are illustrated: Ourapteryx sp. (Fig. 1), Hemithea aquamarina Hampson (Fig. 2), Tanaorhinus raffiesii Moore (Fig. 3), and Scopula sp. (Fig. 4). In total, we recorded twenty females off. (T.) pec?nunguis on the forewing dorsal surface of seven individual moths (Table 1). Parasites were collected from hosts attracted to 175-watt mercury vapor lights in Malaysia and Taiwan in August 2004 and 2005. Parasites and their hosts were collected by AYK and WWH. Additional ectoparasitic flies were observed; unfortunately we were unable to collect them. Data for collected specimens are: Taiwan, Nantou County, Shanlinhsi (=Sanlinchi, 23?38'11N 120?46'50E), 4-viii-2004; same locality, 15-viii 2005; Malaysia: Pahang, Cameron Highlands (4?29'1N 101?27T'E), 10-viii-2004; Kelantan, Route 4 between Gerik and Jeli (5?31 '30N 101?16'30E), 12-viii-2004. One female fly from Taiwan was slide mounted in Euparal and the remaining specimens currently are stored in 1.5 ml vials containing 100% ethanol. Specimens were compared with the original description (de Meijere, 1923) and with six specimens from Samoa and Fiji. The six specimens are in the Museum Support Center, National Museum of Natural History, Suitland, Maryland; identification was further verified through taxonomic keys in Wirth (1956a) and Debenham (1987). Specimens are deposited in the National Museum of Natural History, Washington, D.C. Fifteen of the flies were found on forewing vein A1+2, and two were found on the cubitus. Three additional flies were found in the anal cell several millimeters from vein A1+2. These three flies had their heads embedded

IT having been now finally determined that the Natural History collections of the British Museum shall be removed from their present site to South Kensington, to form the nucleus of a National Museum of Natural History,† it appears to me that the principles upon which the proposed new institution are to be established and conducted, are well worthy of the special and most serious attention of the British Association for the Advancement of Science. The inauguration or a National Museum of Natural History by one of the nations that have contributed most largely to the advancement of the natural sciences, is an event that is not likely to recur very often. If the opportunity thus presented be properly taken advantage of, and the new institution started urion sound principles of administration and arrangement, there can be no doubt that a most material impetus will be given to the progress of natural science in this country.

The present list contains data on type material of 109 mite species (Acaridida and Prostigmata) from Bulgaria (species, described by I. Vassilev, M. Kolebinova, P. Beron) and many foreign countries: Greece, Suriname, the Netherlands, New Guinea, Cuba, Mexico, Chile, USA, Canada, Madagascar, Gaboon, Liberia, Nigeria, Uganda, Mozambique, Tanzania, Zambia, Morocco, Tunisia, Malaysia, Burma, Thailand, China, and the Philippines (species, described by M. Kolebinova, P. Beron, F. Lukoschus, A. Fain, C. Welbourn, F. Dusbabek, K. Samsinak, K. R. Orwig, W. Atyeo and other authors). The type material housed in the National Museum of Natural History, Sofia includes species from the families Acaridae, Glycyphagidae, Canestriniidae, Proctophyllodidae, Trouessartiidae, Syringobiidae, Dermationidae, Ereynetidae, Cytoditidae, Myocoptidae, Chirodiscidae, Gastronyssidae, Myobiidae, Ophioptidae, Demodicidae, Smarididae, Erythraeidae, Neotrombidiidae, Eutrombidiidae, Trombiculidae, Leeuwenhoekiidae, Walchiidae, and Vatacaridae. All Bulgarian and foreign acarologists are kindly invited to submit type specimens under their care in the collections of the National Museum of Natural History in Sofia. This material will be properly housed and well used.

The catalogue of the freshwater crayfish (Crustacea: Decapoda: Astacidae) from Romania preserved in "Grigore Antipa" National Museum of Natural History of Bucharest The largest collection of freshwater crayfish of Romania is preserved in "Grigore Antipa" National Museum of Natural History of Bucharest. The collection consists of 426 specimens of Astacus astacus, A. leptodactylus and Austropotamobius torrentium.