Field Museum of Natural History

The Field Museum of Natural History will digitize 75,000 fern herbarium sheets from the Americas and digitally photograph and database 7,000 fossilized ferns from North America. The museum will make the collections accessible via its KE EMu online database to the scientific and broader community worldwide and will contribute to international databasing projects (e.g., GBIF, Species 2000, the Catalogue of Life, IPNI, EOL, and TROPICOS). To deepen the engagement of students in collection-based programs at partnering universities and colleges in the Chicago area, the project will provide training opportunities for graduate and undergraduate interns to participate in the digitizing activities through an existing collaboration with the Student Center for Science Engagement at Northeastern Illinois University.