Collaborative Research: Accessing Brain Collection Information and Images Via the Internet, CD-ROM and Centralized Location

了解大脑结构对于理解大脑功能至关重要。 哺乳动物的进化导致了大脑解剖结构的许多差异，但我们对这些差异与动物行为的广泛多样性之间的关系知之甚少。 这个合作项目是为了巩固和使研究和教育更容易获得两个主要的集合，形成一个独特的，广泛的，保存完好的哺乳动物大脑标本的比较和进化研究。 它们总共包含超过275个切片和染色的大脑，包括超过50万个显微镜载玻片，代表150多个物种，来自17个不同的哺乳动物目的50个科。 许多标本是不可替代的，来自稀有或濒危物种，并为生物多样性和进化以及神经科学的问题提供了至关重要的独特数据。 这些收藏品将被带到华盛顿特区的一个国家博物馆设施，以加入互补的广泛的人脑收藏，并建立一个长期稳定的存储，策展和比较哺乳动物大脑神经解剖学研究的单一网站。 目前正在开发一个电子网站，供全世界查阅图像。 研究人员可以直接使用这些图像，或者决定是否参观博物馆本身来检查原始保存的生物材料。 这个项目的影响很大。 首先，它为未来的研究安全地保存了一种不可替代的资源，这是数十人50多年来严格工作的科学投资。 其次，它促进了比较神经科学，行为，进化和系统学的多学科研究，以了解已知最复杂器官的多样性。 第三，利用数字成像和多维数据库技术，为如何处理和与其他集合（包括非哺乳动物脊椎动物大脑）共享复杂形态数据提供了工作基础和模型。 第四，该项目将继续产生教育影响，为学校提供方便的网站访问和生物多样性背景下关于脊椎动物大脑的非正式科学教育。

Knowledge of brain structure is essential to understand brain function. The evolution of mammals has resulted in many differences in brain anatomy, but we know very little about how those differences correlate to the wide diversity of animal behavior. This collaborative project is to consolidate and make more accessible for research and education two major collections that form a unique, extensive, remarkably preserved assembly of mammalian brain specimens for comparative and evolutionary studies. Together they contain more than 275 sectioned and stained brains, including over a half million microscope slides, representing over 150 species, from 50 families in 17 different orders of Mammalia. Many specimens are irreplaceable, from rare or endangered species, and provide critically unique data for questions about biodiversity and evolution as well as neuroscience. The collections are being brought to a national museum facility in Washington DC to join complementary extensive human brain collections and establish a single site with long-term stability for storage, curation, and research on comparative mammalian brain neuroanatomy. An electronic website is being developed for worldwide access to images. Researchers can use the images directly, or decide whether to visit the museum itself to examine the original preserved biological material. The impact of this project is high. First, it safely preserves for future research an irreplaceable resource that represents a scientific investment of more than 50 years of exacting work by dozens of people. Second, it promotes multidisciplinary research on comparative neuroscience, behavior, evolution and systematics to understand the diversity in the most complex organ known. Third, using technology of digital imaging and multidimensional databases, it provides a working base as well as a model for how to handle and share complex morphological data with other collections, including those on non-mammalian vertebrate brains. Fourth, the project will continue to have educational impact by providing easy website access for schools and informal science education about the vertebrate brain in the context of biodiversity.