Databasing Bryophytes from the Southeastern U.S. in the Duke University Herbarium

在Jonathan Shaw博士的指导下，杜克大学获得了一笔拨款，用于部分支持一项项目，该项目将杜克大学植物标本馆中美国东南部的苔藓收集资料输入数据库，并使该信息在万维网上可用。美国东南部覆盖了一个生态多样的地理区域。美国东南部的苔藓植物群非常丰富。该地区大约有635种苔藓，几乎占北美所有苔藓种类的50%。杜克大学收集了大约9万份来自美国东南部的苔藓标本，如果不是记录东南部苔藓植物群最重要的资源，也是其中之一。该项目将使用指定作为数据库软件，可从堪萨斯大学信息学生物多样性研究中心获得。该标本数据库将与杜克大学现有的苔藓系统发育分析和分子数据库相连接，为整合分类和分子生物多样性的空间模式提供新的方法。杜克大学苔藓植物标本馆是研究生和本科生进行苔藓生物多样性、生态学和进化研究的场所。植物标本室通过美国国家科学基金会最近资助的REU站点拨款，在本科生培训中发挥了核心作用。目前有四名研究生正在攻读胚胎学博士学位。东南苔藓收集也被用于生物系的几门课程。通过搜索与分类类群、地理位置和/或栖息地类型相关的标本记录，将大大提高收集的效用。目前尚无发表的东南藓类分类摘要。杜克大学的苔藓收藏，特别是美国东南部的苔藓，被世界各地的苔藓学家广泛用于植物区系、专题、发育和分子研究。本提案中概述的数据库工作将有助于识别未充分收集的地区、生物多样性热点地区和拥有稀有分类群的地点。生物多样性的丧失是一个社会问题。为了评估生物多样性的损失，需要了解哪些生物发生在哪些地区，以及生物多样性的地理格局与生态和历史因素的关系。这个项目中提出的数据库提供了原始数据，可以从中进行生态推断。除了大学社区之外，杜克大学的苔藓植物收藏还被地方、州和地区保护组织利用。杜克大学的苔藓学项目每年组织一次由业余和专业的苔藓学家参加的H.L. Blomquist Foray。东南藓类收集信息的可用性将促进业余爱好者和专业人员之间的互动，并增加专业苔藓学界以外的植物学家的收集。

A grant has been awarded to Duke University under the direction of Dr. Jonathan Shaw for partial support of a project to enter accession information for moss collections from the southeastern United States housed in the Duke University herbarium into a database, and make that information available on the Worldwide Web. The southeastern U.S. covers an ecologically diverse geographic region. The moss flora of the southeastern U.S. is remarkably rich. The region hosts approximately 635 species, or almost 50% of all the moss species found in North America. With about 90,000 moss specimens from the southeastern U. S., the Duke collection is one of, if not the most important resource for documenting the southeastern moss flora. The project will utilize SPECIFY as the database software, available from the Informatics Biodiversity Research Center at the University of Kansas. The specimen database will be linked to phylogenetic analyses and molecular databases for mosses available at Duke, facilitating novel approaches to integrating spatial patterns of taxonomic and molecular biodiversity. The Duke bryophyte herbarium is utilized by graduate and undergraduate students conducting research on bryophyte biodiversity, ecology, and evolution. The herbarium plays a central role in undergraduate training through a recently funded REU site grant from NSF. Four graduate students are currently working on Ph.D. degrees in bryology. Southeastern moss collections are also utilized for several courses taught in the Biology Department. Utility of the collections will be greatly increased by the ability to search for specimen records in relation to taxonomic group, geographic location, and/or habitat type. No published taxonomic summary for the southeastern mosses currently exists. The Duke University moss collection, especially the southeastern U.S. accessions, are widely utilized by bryologists worldwide for floristic, monographic, developmental, and molecular research. The databasing efforts outlined in this proposal will facilitate the identification of undercollected areas, biodiversity hotspots, and sites that harbor rare taxa.The loss of biodiversity is a societal problem. In order to evaluate biodiversity losses, basic information is needed about what organisms occur in what areas, and how geographic patterns of biodiversity relate to ecological and historical factors. Databases such as that proposed in this project provide the raw data from which ecological inferences can be made. Well beyond the university community, the Duke bryophyte collection is utilized by local, state, and regional conservation organizations. The Duke bryology program organizes an annual H.L. Blomquist Foray which is attended by both amateur and professional bryologists. Availability of collection information for southeastern mosses will facilitate interactions between amateurs and professionals and increased collecting by botanists outside the professional bryological community.