Natural history specimens

Sir Joseph Banks, 1743-1820. English naturalist and collector of plants and insects President of the Royal Society from 1778-1820. His collections of books and natural history specimens were bequeathed to the British Museum. Lady Banks used to assist him m giving frequent receptions for the scientists... 

Sir Hans Sloane, 1660-1753. Founder of the British Museum. Physician, pharmacist, traveler, and collector of books, manuscripts, coins, medals, gems, antiquities, and natural history specimens. His asbestos specimens were purchased from Benjamin Franklin (63). 

In museum collections, most invertebrates will be encountered as natural history specimens, which are divided into dry and wet-preserved. Those animals having a shell or tough exoskeleton, like starfish, shelled mollusks, and lobsters, may be dried after death. The tissue may be removed, but it is often left inside the shell or carapace to shrivel and dry. Wet-preserved specimens are usually fixed in a solution of formalin or some other preservative to prevent the tissues from deteriorating quickly after death. After a brief period, the specimen is usually removed from the toxic fixing solution, rinsed, and placed in a storage solution of 70% ethanol (alcohol) mixed with water. 

R. Wagstaffe and J. H. Fidler, Preservation of Natural History Specimens, Volume 2 Zoology/Vertebrates. H. F. G. Witherby Ltd., London, 1968. 

Aldehyde-releasing agents, particularly those which release formaldehyde, find application in a number of processes as preservatives, such as in cutting-oil emulsions and latexes [325]. Formaldehyde may be applied to natural keratin fibres in the leather and textile industry to prevent problems of anthrax contamination [341], in paints as preservatives [342] and in the construction industry as toxic washes to prevent microbial growth on large surface areas [343] or as additives in concrete itself [344]. Formaldehyde has long been used as a preservative for natural history specimens in, for example, museums, to prevent biodeterioration and maintain the structure of organs and tissues [345]. 

Vapors emitted from the materials of closed storage and exhibit cases have been a frequent source of pollution problems. Oak wood, which in the past was often used for the constmction of such cases, emits a significant amount of organic acid vapors, including formic and acetic acids, which have caused corrosion of metal objects, as well as shell and mineral specimens in natural history collections. Plywood and particle board, especially those with a urea—formaldehyde adhesive, similarly often emit appreciable amounts of corrosive vapors. Sealing of these materials has proven to be not sufficiently rehable to prevent the problem, and generally thek use for these purposes is not considered acceptable practice. 

We are grateful to the American Museum of Natural History and the Metropolitan Museum of Art for permission to sample specimens for compositional analysis. This material is based upon work supported by the National Science Foundation under Grant No. BNS76--3397. Aspects of the investigation were carried out under the auspices of the U. S. Department of Energy. 

Third, continued periodic monitoring of fishery and wildlife resources is important, especially in areas with potential for reservoir development, in light of the hypothesis that increased flooding increases the availability of mercury to biota. The use of museum collections for mercury analysis is strongly recommended for monitoring purposes. For example, the Environmental Specimen Bank at the Swedish Museum of Natural History constitutes a base for ecotoxicological research and for spatial and trend monitoring of mercury and other contaminants in Swedish fauna (Odsjo et al. 1997). 

Occurrences in the United States were known as early as 1698 with numerous finds along Brandywine Creek in Pennsylvania (Frondel, 1988). The celebrated purse made from asbestos that Benjamin Franklin took to London in 1724, and which now resides in the British Museum of Natural History, may have been made of long-fiber asbestos from Newbury, Massachusetts. As a journeyman printer, Franklin made paper from asbestos, as did many Europeans. It was also used in making lamp wicks and cloth. Commercial mining in the United States took place some time after the first discovery of asbestos on Staten Island, New York, in 1818. (Asbestos continued to be mined at the site until 1876.) By 1825 more than seventy localities were known to produce asbestos in the United States (Robinson, 1825). However, as early as 1804 Jameson had recorded the mineralogy of the species and listed the numerous university, societal, and private mineral collections containing specimens of asbestos from U.S. localities and asbestos products of local manufacture. 

In 1799 Luigi Palcani published analyses of two authentic specimens of natural Oriental natrum one which Pietro Andrea Mattioli had brought, more than two centuries before, from Constantinople for Ulisse Aldrovandi s Museum of Natural History, and another which Edward Wortley Montague had brought from Alexandria. Palcani found, as du Hamel had stated, that the natrum was composed mainly of sodium carbonate (43). It also contained varying amounts of sodium bicarbonate, sodium chloride, sodium sulfate, and water (44). 

Professor von Hevesy and Thai Jantzen separated hafnia from zirconia by repeated recrystallization of the double ammonium or potassium fluorides (20, 26). Metallic hafnium has been isolated and found to have the same crystalline structure as zirconium. A small specimen of the first metallic hafnium ever made is on permanent display at the American Museum of Natural History in New York City. Dr. von Hevesy, who prepared it, presented it to the Museum for the collection of chemical elements (29). A. E. van Arkel and J. H. de Boer prepared hafnium by passing the vapor of the tetraiodide over a heated tungsten filament (26, 30). 

Pleistocene Epoch, courtesy The American Museum of Natural History. c Fossilized specimen, courtesy The American Museum of Natural History. d Collagenous material extracted with boiling water for 2 hrs. 

As mentioned above, the special position of the museum environment is founded by a fourth emission source the exhibits themselves. In natural history collections formalin, an aqueous formaldehyde solution (30%-40%), is still used for the conservation of animal specimens as well as formaldehyde and formic acid for the conservation and preparation of zoological exhibits. Schieweck et al. (2005) analyzed formaldehyde concentrations in a zoological collection. The measuring apparatus was located at a distance of 1 m from a metal cupboard in which animal preparations are stored in formalin solutions acting as direct emission source and causing an intense smell. In contrast to normal conditions of use (28 Xgm 3) when the cabinet doors were kept closed, the formaldehyde concentration was increased three times when the doors were opened (90 xgm 3). 

Except as specimens in natural history collections, amphibians produce litde in the way of materials used by artists or in the manufacture of practical objects. 

Animal group Secondary group Type of specimens in natural history collections Derived materials found in museum collections... 

All of the natural history collections described here may also be associated with ancillary collections of data in various forms, and derived specimens such as slide-mounted histological or dissected parts, SEM mounts, photographs, or frozen tissue. Table 6.7 is a basic list of the types of materials associated with each major group of animals. 

In order for anyone to make decisions regarding the storage, care, and use of collections, they must be aware of the materials present. In natural history collections, this is usually simple. A butterfly is a butterfly, and a worm is a worm. But art and historical collections are devoted to made objects things fashioned for a purpose. Specimens may be made of a single material, sometimes natural, sometimes synthetic. These collections also contain composite objects things made of a combination of materials, many of which have been altered from their original state. 

Newer techniques have allowed the isolation of nucleic acids from preserved specimens.1 Because DNA isolation requires the destruction of preserved material, this aspect of obtaining tissue necessitates new procedures in the handling of museum specimens and in the protocols that investigators will follow to gain access to museum specimens. As an example, we outline the procedures that the American Museum of Natural History currently has in effect, or intends to place into effect. Other museums will undoubtedly have different procedures, so we recommend strongly that individual institutions be consulted when material is needed. 

Nineteen archaeological pre-Columbian textile specimens from the collections of the American Museum of Natural History and the Metropolitan Museum of Art were examined. The textiles (Huari/Tiahuanaco, lea, Paracas-Caver-nas, and Paracas-Necropolis) are described. Elemental analyses for archaeological textile and modern wool samples (C, H, N, S, and ash) are reported. Elemental analyses for samples treated with distilled H20 and CClk are compared with analyses of modern wool samples similarly treated. An unambiguous direct correlation between loss of sulfur and embrittlement could not be made. The possibilities of dating and provenance determination by technical means are discussed. 

Specimen Selection. Specimens supplied by the American Museum of Natural History and the Metropolitan Museum of Art were chosen for well documented archaeological excavations. Most of the specimens... 

The crested Porcupine Hystrix), as an index fossil , substantiates the allocation of two more faunal assemblages of lesser importance to the Varboian stage. One of these is from the Biikk Mountains. A collection of a few bones was found in old collections of the Department of Palaeontology of the Hungarian Natural History Museum. According to the specimen labels, the bones were collected in 1936 by... 

Finally, I will list those Mousterian localities or layers, the faunal lists of which were given in Mottl (1941) and Vertes (1965), that contain mainly previously identified and sometimes mixed material, often without numbers of specimens. These include part of the brown layer of the Kiskevely cave, the layers c and e of the Szelim cave ( c , the hyaena horizon of Gaal was archaeologically sterile) which I reviewed in the collection of the Hungarian Natural History Museum. 

It will be observed that all of the meteorites contain, in addition to nickel, a small quantity of cobalt, whilst the carbon content is extremely small. Carbon is sometimes present in meteoric iron in the form of minute diamonds.2 The Rowton specimen is interesting as being the first sidente observed to fall in Great Britain, and may be seen in the Natural History Museum, South Kensington. The Perryville siderite is the first recorded instance of the presence of ruthenium in meteoric iron. In addition to traces of this element, traces of iridium, palladium, and platinum were detected. 

Hales, Stephen. Vegetable Staticks or, An account of some statical experiments on the sap in vegetables being an essay towards a natural history of vegetation. Also, a specimen of an attempt to analyse the air, by a great variety of chymo-statical experiments, which were read at several meetings before the Royal Society (London W., and J. Innys, 1727). 

Since then, TEM has been used to study dislocation microstructures in a wide range of naturally and experimentally deformed minerals and rocks. In general, the aim of the experimental studies is to determine the deformation mechanisms by relating the evolution of the observed mi-crostructures to the macroscopic deformational behavior observed under varying conditions of temperature, confining pressure, chemical environment, strain-rate, stress, and total strain, and then to use this knowledge to interpret the microstructures observed in naturally deformed specimens and hence to determine their deformational history. 

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