Support for the Field Museum Fossil Mammal Collection: A New Collection Facility

菲尔德自然历史博物馆的哺乳动物化石收藏是研究和教育的重要的国家和国际系统和古生物学资源。它包括6万多个已编目的标本。其中，自1981年以来收集了2万份，这意味着与它们相关的数据非常完整。然而，这种增长速度使收藏非常拥挤，这对标本来说是一种危险；此外，多年来不可能把所有的哺乳动物化石标本放在连续的箱子里。菲尔德博物馆最近建造了一个新空间来存放它的某些藏品。该项目将在新空间的一部分安装压实机，用新的案例填充这些空间，并将整个哺乳动物化石收藏移动到一个连续的案例部分。这一举措将加强标本的管理和保护，使收藏更容易用于教育和研究，并使收藏管理更有效。这个110万美元的项目是由美国国家科学基金会系统学和生态学研究收藏项目和菲尔德博物馆合作资助的，后者提供了大约55%的建筑和设备成本、学生学费和工作人员时间。

9631431 Flynn The fossil mammal collections at the Field Museum of Natural History is an imortant national and international systematic and paleontological resource for research and education. It comprises more than 60,000 catalogued specimens. Of these, 20,000 have been collected since 1981, which means that the data associated with them is exceptionally complete. This rate of growth, however, has rendered the collection very overcrowded, which is a danger to the specimens; in addition, for some years it has not been possible to house all of the fossil mammal specimens in contiguous cases. The Field Museum recently constructed a new space to house certain of its collections. This project will install compactors in a portion of the new space, fill these with new cases, and move the entire fossil mammal collection into one contiguous section of cases. Such a move will enhance curation and conservation of the specimens, make the collection much more accessible for use in education and research, and enable more efficient collection management. This $1.1 million project is funded in partnership between the Research Collections in Systematics & Ecology program of the NSF and the Field Museum, which is providing approximately 55% of the total in construction and equipment costs, student tuition, and staff time.