The Fish Collection of the American Museum of Natural History is one of the largest in North America, comprising more than 200,000 specimen lots, more than a million individual specimens, and more than 1200 type specimens. Dr. Gareth Nelson, Curator of the collection, proposes an expansion of the collection through incorporation of marine larval fishes from the Gulf of Mexico and the Atlantic Ocean off the U.S. coast. Dr. Nelson also plans to complete the conversion of the spirit collection fluids from isopropanol to ethanol, assuring better preservation of tissue and coloration patterns. Systematic collections in natural history museums are the primary data resources with which biologists analyze the results of evolution. Ecologists, biogeographers, and evolutionary systematists are completely dependent on these repositories of biological diversity for the basic materials for study. Proper curation and steady growth of these collections are essential for the long-term study of biodiversity and evolution.
