University of Oklahoma

The Sam Noble Oklahoma Museum of Natural History will initiate a three-year project to catalog, database, and georeference (assign geographic coordinates) specimens in its Collection of Recent Invertebrates, including the largest and most comprehensive collection of riffle beetles in the world. The museum will share the project with its audience via media outlets, public events, and publications. The database will be accessible to museum staff, scientists, federal and state agencies, environmental organizations, and the general public through the museum Web site and other distributed natural history collection network portals. The project will allow the museum to gain intellectual and physical control of its collection, upgrade the management of collection data, expand the accessibility of specimen information, and increase the capacity for collections-based research.