The Missouri Botanical Garden is one of the world's most important centers for botanical research and for curation of plant specimens. The Curators of the Herbarium are leading researchers on tropical plants, and the collections amassed at the Garden represent an enormous and unique resource for research. Botanists from around the world visit these collections and request specimens on loan, and access to these collections is critical for hundreds of current research projects. Unfortunately, the rate at which new collections have arrived has outpaced the Garden's ability to mount, identify, label, and file specimens in the collections. More than 300,000 specimens have accumulated in "backlog", and the research community has expressed strong desire for access to these specimens. Dr. Solomon will oversee an aggressive three-year campaign to eliminate this backlog, and to put in place curatorial procedures that will prevent future backlogs from accumulating. Processing the specimen backlog at the Missouri Botanical Garden will benefit research collections around the world. Research into tropical biodiversity, medicinal use of native plants, ecological and evolutionary studies all rely on these collections, and processing the backlog into accessible collections will make the Garden's Herbarium collection a more comprehensive research resource.
