Secure Storage and Computerization of Records of the University of California, Riverside, Nematode Collection

加州大学河滨线虫收藏馆（UCRNC）是世界上最大的具有重要经济意义的植物寄生线虫博物馆之一，拥有13000瓶散装标本和近150000个标本，装在32000张载玻片上进行显微镜检查。来自世界各地的科学家使用这些标本来研究线虫，用于许多学科的研究，包括农业、生态学、遗传学、分类学、进化和无脊椎动物学。该收藏保存了来自新物种描述的原始标本，作为先前研究记录的凭证标本，以及来自全球调查的标本，这些标本提供了对线虫多样性的深入了解。由于线虫是最丰富和最多样化的多细胞生物之一，由于它们经常作为基础生物学研究的方便模型，并且由于在一些发展中国家，植物寄生形式是农业的限制因素，因此有效的博物馆资源是必不可少的。以前NSF的支持通过UCRNC的计算机化提供了方便的防火存储和可靠的记录更新，但是资金只足够存储和更新三分之二的馆藏记录。目前的建议是将这些改进扩展到收藏的其余部分，并允许安全存储，以容纳适度增长（增加3000张幻灯片）。记录的计算机化不仅使人们能够迅速查阅现有资料，而且还能对外借标本进行仔细监测，并根据物种、寄主、地理区域、制备技术、采集或制备日期、分类类别、文献参考和其他参数进行交叉索引。UCRNC的计算机化也将为其他博物馆的有效编目提供一个模式。类似线虫学集合的通用格式将允许最终在一台计算机上存储多个集合的记录，以便广泛访问组合数据。

The University of California Riverside Nematode Collection (UCRNC) is one of the largest museums of economically important plant parasitic nematodes in the world, with 13,000 vials of bulked specimens and nearly 150,000 specimens mounted on 32,000 slides for microscopic examination. The collection is used by scientists from throughout the world, studying nematodes for research in many disciplines including agriculture, ecology, genetics, taxonomy, evolution, and invertebrate zoology. The collection conserves original specimens from descriptions of new species, voucher specimens as a record of previous research, and specimens from worldwide surveys which provide insight into the diversity of nematodes. Since nematodes are one of the most abundant and diverse multicellular organisms, since they frequently serve as a convenient model for research in fundamental biology, and since in some developing countries plant parasitic forms are the limiting factor in agriculture, efficient museum resources are essential. Previous NSF support provided convenient accessible fireproof storage and reliable updating of records through computerization of UCRNC, but funding was only adequate for storage and updating of records for two-thirds of the collection. The present proposal is to extend these improvements to the remainder of the collection and allow secure storage which will accommodate modest growth (3000 additional slides). Computerization of records will not only allow quick access of available material but will provide for careful monitoring of loaned specimens and cross-indexing according to species, host, geographical area, preparation technique, date of collection or preparation, taxonomic category, literature reference and other parameters. Computerization of UCRNC will also provide a model for efficient cataloguing of other museums. A common format for similar nematology collections will allow eventual storage of records of several collections on a single computer for widespread accessibility of the combined data.