A variable pressure scanning electron microscope (SEM), a critical point dryer and a sputter coater will be used for research in the systematic biology of various groups of organisms. This SEM will be used to collect morphological data of a wide variety of living and extinct organisms. This equipment, together with existing dissecting and light microscopes, a CCD digital camera for microscopy, scanners and computer workstations will be used to establish a core microscopy and image analysis facility in the Department of Biological Sciences at George Washington University. Access to SEM is essential to accomplish the goals of six research groups (four of them with active projects currently funded by NSF) in the departments of Biological Sciences and Anthropology at The George Washington University. At present at least seven faculty, two postdocs, and 17 graduate students will be using this instrument. The following research projects will use the SEM facility described in the proposal: Systematics of araneoid spiders; Evolutionary history of flowering plants; SEM analysis of skeletal tissue growth; Systematics of Ciliated Protista; Anatomy and phylogeny of dinosaurs and other mesozoic reptiles; and SEM analysis of spermatozoa, spermatozeugmata, and secondary sex organs of inseminating ostariophysan fishes. Over the next three years these researchers and their collaborators and students will have to take an estimated 21,000 SEM micrographs in the course of the research projects described in this proposal.
