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1 The Repository of Life
Pages 17-44

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From page 17...
... Such collections of non-living specimens are commonly referred to as natural history collections. Living specimens include research and model organisms that are grown and maintained in genetic stock centers, germplasm repositories, or living biodiversity collections.
From page 18...
... Fortunately, collections can help there, too -- fossil collections. Later studies expanded on Woodward's work and continued with a project to examine stomatal density in fossil plants, which provided evidence about how changes in atmospheric carbon dioxide levels may have affected biodiversity in prehistoric times (Soul et al., 2018)
From page 19...
... The Repository of Life 19 BOX 1-2 Thermus aquaticus: Breaking Biological Barriers Image by lorcel on iStockphoto.com In the mid-1960s, Thomas Brock, a microbiologist, and his undergraduate student Hudson Freeze made an unanticipated discovery. With support from the National Science Foundation, Brock was collecting and studying heat-loving microorganisms from hot springs and geysers in Yellowstone National Park.
From page 20...
... Fortunately, Brock and Freeze had already done the legwork, and crucially for Mullis, Brock had also sent live samples of the heat-loving T aquaticus to the American Type Culture Collection (Innis et al., 1988)
From page 21...
... At many U.S. universities, natural history collections expose students to the diversity of life and form the foundation for teaching concepts of evolution, ecology, taxonomy, and more.
From page 22...
... Until 2011, infrastructure for living collections and natural history collections were supported through separate solicitations. In 2017, NSF suspended its collections infrastructure support program, which sparked an outcry from the scientific community (Nowogrodzki, 2016a; Rogers, 2016)
From page 23...
... NSF asked that these tasks be addressed in the context of the "living stocks (organisms) and preserved repositories of biodiversity specimens and materials" (i.e., natural history collections)
From page 24...
... . These reports address specific categories of biological collections: a total of six reports on federal biological collections, geological collections, living stock collections, genetic collections, and natural history collections.
From page 25...
... and Managing Global Genetic Resources: Agricultural Crop Issues and Policies (NRC, 1993b) This Consensus Study Report series examines needs and approaches in pre serving genetic material for agriculture, including the worldwide network of genetic collections, the role of biotechnology, and a host of issues that surround management and use.
From page 26...
... They are housed in natural history or science museums, botanical gardens, universities, biological resource or stock centers, or private or even small collections of the sort that result from the efforts of one or a few investigators working on a single project. The scientific literature is replete with research made possible only, or primarily, because of biological collections and their unique combination of biological material and associated data.
From page 27...
... ,5 the surge of available digital information for natural history collections is resulting in an increase of users of these collections and will undoubtedly spur research innovations in all disciplines of science (see Chapter 5)
From page 28...
... For centuries, scientists wanting to study a particular specimen from a natural history collection had to visit the place where it was held or have the specimen sent to them, leaving the item susceptible to loss or damage (Olsen, 2015)
From page 29...
... . In many cases, analyses of both living stock and natural history collections are essential for public health officials to 11 See http://mvz.berkeley.edu/Grinnell/pubs.html.
From page 31...
... Stanley, Florida Museum of Natural History; field notes picture by Mary Lewandowski; ecto and endo parasites image; and the georeferences map from the U.S. Geological Survey.
From page 32...
... global pandemic, which provides a timely example of how living and natural history collections infrastructure can be integrated to detect, describe, and mitigate emerging infectious diseases. During outbreaks and pandemics, living stock collections, such as the American Type Culture Collection and some of the government contracts they manage,12 maintain and distribute virus strains and associated materials for basic research and development of diagnostic tests, therapeutics, vaccines, and detection methods.
From page 33...
... . Natural history collections are an essential resource for studying pathogen hosts and their spatial and temporal distribution (Harmon et al., 2019)
From page 34...
... Living collections, because of the nature of their maintenance, are particularly vulnerable to inconsistent preservation and, as such, would be irreparably damaged. The loss of genetic stock collections, each a centralized source of materials for a global research community, would irreparably sever the connection between past, present, and future research needs of thousands of research labs that rely on them.
From page 35...
... Natural history collections have been falsely regarded as drawers full of quaint but irrelevant old specimens by some, but well-curated collections contain a temporal record of specimens that have been studied and annotated by generations of scientists. Such collections need to be actively growing, embracing new kinds of specimens, and adopting new technologies to extend their value.
From page 36...
... We need a new approach to research infrastructure, one more dynamic and flexible in to recognize the importance of making a long-term commitment to the infrastructure that is needed to maintain, grow, and make biological collections available, in much the same way that oceanographic research vessels support ocean science. Combined with a scarcity of funding, the lack of a long-term commitment or plan for this infrastructure (see Chapter 4)
From page 37...
... A critical component of this effort is the value of biological collections research to a range of demographic and psychographic groups, including tribal peoples, as well as citizen/community scientists contributing to the body of knowledge. Chapter 6 also recognizes within its diversity mandate that STEM education is supported by an ecosystem that includes not only schools and universities, but also museums, community organizations, and afterschool/summer activities.
From page 38...
... , but there have been problems in multiple other countries as well, such as the 2016 fire at the National Museum of Natural History in New Delhi (Nijar, 2016)
From page 39...
... A lack of coordination and integration both within and across different collections also hinders research involving multiple collections. Challenge: Incomplete Inventory of Existing Living Stock and Natural History Collections The precise number and extent of biological collections in the United States are unknown, in part because there is no system-wide process for identifying and cataloging these collections.
From page 40...
... . To start closing the gaps, the taxonomy group at the National Center for Biotechnology Information has created a platform to connect genetic sequence records to specimens of living organisms preserved in living stock collections and to vouchers -- representative specimens stored for later examination -- held in natural history collections (Sharma et al., 2018)
From page 41...
... With strategic thinking and steady resource investments, biological collections could continue to be at the heart of scientific advances and education for the foreseeable future. Looking ahead, the committee developed a common vision for how best to support, promote, and utilize the biological collections community over the next decade: Provide long-term support for collections-based scientific research, instill a culture of stewardship for and access to biological specimens, build and grow biological collections to better represent global biodiversity in space and time, promote access to biological collections as important educational resources for the general public, and encourage the exchange of biological resources and knowledge.
From page 42...
... For instance, the Society for the Preservation of Natural History Collections has made tremendous progress over the past three decades in building a community-driven organization with a common voice. Certain living stock collections have also been successful in establishing national and global networks, such as USCCN (McCluskey et al., 2016; Wu et al., 2017)
From page 43...
... recognizes the im portance of preserving global biodiversity and sharing benefits arising from the use of genetic resources. The Nagoya Protocol on Access to Genetic Resources and the Fair and Equitable Sharing of Benefits Arising from their Utilization to the Convention on Biological Diversity (the Nagoya Protocol)


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