Digitization PEN: Invertebrates from the Rocky Mountains and Great Plains: University of Colorado Museum of Natural History expands taxonomic and geographic coverage of InvertEBase

北美西部的大平原和落基山脉生态系统支持着独特的、未被充分研究的无脊椎动物生物多样性。这些脆弱的生态系统正受到该区域前所未有的人口增长的影响，导致土地使用的变化，如基础设施和娱乐活动的增加。这些生态系统也受到北美西部变暖和变干趋势的威胁，这导致野火风险上升。为了减轻这些变化的负面影响，需要了解无脊椎动物的物种分布和生物多样性，以帮助制定知情的土地管理和保护政策。科罗拉多大学自然历史博物馆(UCM)无脊椎动物动物学收藏记录了科罗拉多州落基山脉和大平原120年来生态系统的变化。该项目将允许研究人员、教育工作者和公众通过将收集的数据数字化并上传到包括InvertEBase和iDigBio在内的基于网络的门户网站，自由地获取该收藏的标本数据。这些标本数据将包括北美非昆虫无脊椎动物物种的分类和地理覆盖范围，重点是蜗牛、小龙虾、海绵、水蚤和蚯蚓。科罗拉多大学的本科生和研究生将接受数据管理、博物馆管理和最佳实践方面的培训。该项目将为中学夏令营计划开展活动。活动将旨在促进科学素养，并将主要服务于STEM中历史上代表性不足的群体。通过与现有的主题收集网络(TCN)InvertEBase合作，该项目将为研究人员、土地管理人员和普通公众扩展北美无脊椎动物物种地理范围和生物多样性的现有数据。来自科罗拉多州落基山脉和大平原的43,000多批无脊椎动物将首次可以通过电子方式获取UCM标本记录。将拍摄和分享1000多个样本标本的高分辨率叠加数字图像，其中将包括277个初级模式标本。来自收藏的大约150张历史显微镜幻灯片将用扫描显微镜成像，以产生来自各种分类群的重要诊断特征的研究质量图像。最后，来自落基山脉和大平原的8000个腹足类蜗牛记录将被地理参考，以促进科学和公众对这一群体的分布的了解，以及海拔和气候如何影响它们的分布。这一奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的智力优势和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

The Great Plains and Rocky Mountains ecosystems in Western North America support unique and understudied invertebrate biodiversity. These delicate ecosystems are being impacted by unprecedented human population increases in the region, resulting in changes to land use such as increased infrastructure and recreational activities. These ecosystems are also in peril from the warming and drying trend in Western North America, which is causing a rise in wild fire risk. To mitigate the negative impacts of these changes, awareness of invertebrate species distributions and biodiversity is needed to help make informed land management and conservation policies. The University of Colorado Museum of Natural History (UCM) Invertebrate Zoology collection documents 120 years of Colorado Rocky Mountains and Great Plains changing ecosystem. This project will allow researchers, educators and the public to freely access specimen data from this collection, through digitization and upload of the collection’s data to web based portals including InvertEBase and iDigBio. These specimen data will include taxonomic and geographic coverage of North American non-insect invertebrate species, with an emphasis on snails, crayfish, sponges, leeches and earthworms. Undergraduate and graduate students at the University of Colorado will be trained in data management, museum curation and best practices. The project will develop activities for a middle school summer camp program. Activities will be designed to promote scientific literacy, and will mainly serve historically underrepresented groups in STEM. By partnering with the existing Thematic Collections Network (TCN) InvertEBase, this project will extend the available data for invertebrate species’ geographic ranges and biodiversity in North America for researchers, land managers and the general public. For the first time, UCM specimen records will be electronically accessible for over 43,000 lots of invertebrates from the Colorado Rocky Mountains and Great Plains. High resolution stacked digital images of over 1,000 exemplar specimens will be taken and shared, and will include 277 primary type specimens. Approximately 150 historic microscope slides from the collection will be imaged with a scanning microscope to produce research quality images of important diagnostic features from a variety of taxa. Finally, 8,000 gastropod snail records from the Rocky Mountains and Great Plains will be georeferenced to allow advancement in scientific and public understanding of the distribution of this group, and how elevation and climate influence their distribution.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.