USGS Patuxent Wildlife Research Center SIS Project

Accession Number

5001782

Title

Curation of the North American Vertebrate Collections, Smithsonian Institution

Project Description

The Curatorial Project is responsible for maintaining, overseeing, and facilitating the use of

approximately 900,000 North American Natural History specimens and associated data records in

the Divisions of Birds, Mammals, and Amphibians and Reptiles at the National Museum of

Natural History, Smithsonian Institution, Washington, D.C. Many specimens and their associated

data are historically important, well over 100 years old, and a significant portion of specimen

records are in need of taxonomic review and have not been data captured in the electronic data

base. Activities include collecting specimens, identification of specimens, processing and

cataloguing incoming specimens, computer capture of specimen data, routine care of collections,

curation of selected portions of the collections, processing loans of scientific specimens to

researchers at other institutions, and handling information and identification requests for Federal

and State agencies and University researchers. Members of the national and international

scientific communities are served as a direct result of our activities of providing identifications, well

curated collections, specimen data, information, and research access to the collections and

associated records in the care of this program.

Keywords

collection management, collection records, curation, north american, specimens, systematics,

taxonomy, vertebrates,

Principal

Robert P Reynolds, USGS Patuxent Wildlife Research Center: Robert_Reynolds@usgs.gov;

Investigators

Claudia Angle, USGS Patuxent Wildlife Research Center: Claudia_Angle@usgs.gov; Roger

Clapp, USGS Patuxent Wildlife Research Center: Roger_Clapp@usgs.gov; Suzanne Peurach,

USGS Patuxent Wildlife Research Center: Suzanne_Peurach@usgs.gov; Robert Fisher, USGS

Patuxent Wildlife Research Center: Robert_Fisher@usgs.gov; Steve Gotte, USGS Patuxent

Wildlife Research Center: Steve_Gotte@usgs.gov; James Poindexter, USGS Patuxent Wildlife

Research Center: James_Poindexter@usgs.gov;

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