Digitization PEN: Contribution of Digital Data from Ground-dwelling Orthopteroid Orders at American Museum of Natural History to the Symbiota Collections of Arthropods Network

我们的地球是一个动态的，不断变化的星球，各种物种相互作用，从微小的病毒和细菌到百吨重的鲸鱼。地球上几乎所有生命的存在都是由于复杂的相互作用，这些相互作用通过授粉、分解、营养循环等产生或允许生产食物、药物、住所、纤维、燃料。通过研究物种分布和多样性，以及与环境因素相关的地理范围内物种内部和物种之间的物理变化，可以了解生态系统变化对这些相互作用和产品的级联后果。自然历史收藏品保存着这些信息，记录着从昨天到数百万年前发生的事情。这些研究收集可以揭示过去事件的假定原因，从中可以预测生态系统可能采取的未来方向，并为潜在的不稳定结果做好准备。然而，这些收集的细节，有些可以追溯到150年前或更早，通常记录在一张小纸条上，纸条绑在翅膀上，塞在骨头的凹槽里，或者在收集的昆虫下面用别针扎穿。为了揭开过去的秘密，造福未来，必须将分类、地点、时间和相关的环境条件收集信息转录成数字形式，以供分析使用。节肢动物共栖收集网络专题收集网络（SCAN TCN）已将16个美国机构从美国西南部和墨西哥收集的精选地栖昆虫标本进行了数字化。作为现有网络（PEN）的合作伙伴，美国自然历史博物馆无脊椎动物学部（IZ）将提供来自53800只地栖蟑螂（“Blattaria”）、土蜈蚣（皮翅目）、蟋蟀和蚱蜢（直翅目）标本的数据，这些标本代表了AMNH收集的大约310种物种。自动图像裁剪和光学字符识别等工具以及志愿公民科学家的帮助是这项工作不可或缺的一部分，对于不超过一厘米的旧手写标签来说，这通常是一个缓慢而繁琐的过程。其结果将是对物种多样性、当前和过去生态系统的代表性以及自然和人为活动的影响有更全面和有力的了解。通过对地点的地理参考，可以绘制标本的空间和时间图，改进物种分布，改进分布、生态和多样性变化模型。目标物种的雄性、雌性、替代形态和AMNH全型的高分辨率图像将有助于物种识别和比较。蠼螋后肢（后钳）和扩大的蚱蜢后翅的其他图像将可用于数据可视化项目。数据和图像将通过AMNH的门户网站以及GIBF.org、iDigBio.org和SCAN与更大的科学界和公众共享。该奖项反映了美国国家科学基金会的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

Our Earth is a dynamic, ever-changing planet of interacting species ranging from microscopic viruses and bacteria to hundred-ton whales. Just about all life on Earth exists due to intricate interactions that produce or allow for the production of food, medicine, shelter, fiber, fuel through pollination, decomposition, nutrient cycling and more. The cascading consequences of ecosystem shifts on these interactions and products can be understood by examining species distribution and diversity, as well as physical variation within and among species across a geographic range, in relation to environmental factors. Natural history collections hold such information and are a record of what happened yesterday to millions of years ago. These research collections can reveal putative reasons for past events, from which predictions about the future direction ecosystems may take and preparations for potentially volatile outcomes can be made. However, the details in these collections, some dating back 150 years or more, are often recorded on a minute slip of paper tied to a wing, tucked in the grooves of a bone or pierced with a pin underneath a collected insect. To unlock the secrets of the past for the benefit of the future, taxonomic, locality, time, and associated environmental condition collection information must be transcribed into digital form to be available for analysis. The Symbiota Collection of Arthropods Network Thematic Collection Network (SCAN TCN) has digitized specimens of select ground-dwelling insects collected from the southwestern U.S. and Mexico from 16 U.S. institutions. As a Partner to the Existing Network (PEN), the Division of Invertebrate Zoology (IZ) of the American Museum of Natural History will contribute data from 53,800 ground-dwelling roach (‘Blattaria’), earwig (Dermaptera), cricket and grasshopper (Orthoptera) specimens representing ca. 310 species in the AMNH collection. Tools such as automated image cropping and optical character recognition and help of volunteer citizen scientists are integral to this effort, an often slow and tedious process for old, handwritten labels no larger than a centimeter. The result will be a more complete and robust understanding of species diversity and representation of current and past ecosystems and the impact of natural and anthropogenic activities. Localities will be georeferenced so specimens can be mapped in space and time, species distributions can be refined and models of distributional, ecological and diversity changes can be improved. High resolution images of exemplar males, females, alternative morphs, and AMNH holotypes for target species will aid in species identification and comparison. Additional images of earwig cerci (hind pincers) and expanded grasshopper hindwings will be available for data visualization projects. Data and images will be shared with the greater scientific community and public through AMNH’s portal, as well as with GIBF.org, iDigBio.org and SCAN.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.