Restoration of Oklahoma Museum of Natural History Vertebrate Paleontology Collection, Phase II

俄克拉荷马州自然历史博物馆脊椎动物古生物学藏品修复，第二阶段

• 批准号: 9024999
• 负责人: Richard Cifelli
• 金额: $ 17.45万
• 依托单位: University of Oklahoma Norman Campus
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 1991
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 1991-09-15 至 1994-02-28
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=9024999&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: Restoration; Oklahoma; Museum; Natural; History

The Vertebrate Paleontology collection of the Oklahoma Museum of Natural History includes more that 30,000 specimens, collected primarily from the southern plains of the U.S. The collection is an important regional repository for fossil vertebrates, and ranks 15th among U.S. collections of its type. Most of the collection was amassed during the 1930s and 1940s under the direction of J. Willis Stovall, first Director of the Museum. Following his death in 1953 the collection was neglected and fell into disrepair, but through the efforts of Dr. Richard Cifelli, appointed as Curator in 1986, the collection has been restored to a high level of activity. Approximately one-fourth of the collection has been restored, cataloged, reorganized, and transferred to modern storage cabinets. Dr. Cifelli proposes another phase in the collection's restoration, during which fossils of Cenozoic age (mostly mammals) will also be brought to a high level of curation. The proposed collection improvement project will salvage an important research collection, and will make it easily accessible to visiting investigators and through loans. Natural history collections such as this are essential resources for research on evolution, biogeography, and global change. Continued growth and improvement of these collections will benefit many generations of researchers.

俄克拉荷马自然历史博物馆的古脊椎动物藏品包括 30,000 多个标本，主要采集自美国南部平原。该藏品是重要的区域脊椎动物化石宝库，在美国同类藏品中排名第 15 位。 大部分藏品是在 20 世纪 30 年代和 1940 年代在博物馆第一任馆长 J. Willis Stovall 的指导下收集的。 1953 年他去世后，该藏品被忽视并年久失修，但在 1986 年被任命为馆长的理查德·西菲利 (Richard Cifelli) 博士的努力下，该藏品已恢复到高水平的活动状态。 大约四分之一的藏品已被修复、编目、重组并转移到现代储藏柜中。 西菲利博士提出了藏品修复的另一个阶段，在此期间，新生代化石（主要是哺乳动物）也将得到高水平的管理。 拟议的藏品改进项目将抢救重要的研究藏品，并使来访的研究人员可以轻松地通过贷款获得这些藏品。 诸如此类的自然历史收藏是进化、生物地理学和全球变化研究的重要资源。 这些馆藏的持续增长和改进将使许多代研究人员受益。