Featured BIOSPEX Project
The Vanderbilt University Collection at BRIT (Original Project)
Contact
Organization
Botanical Research Institute of Texas
Partners
The Southeastern Regional Network of Expertise and Collections (SERNEC)
Funding Source
National Science Foundation under award #410069. Any opinions, findings, and conclusions or recommendations expressed in this material are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views of the National Science Foundation.
Description
Specimens belonging to the Vanderbilt University Collection (VDB) at the Botanical Research Institute of Texas (BRIT)
The VDB Herbarium was founded at Vanderbilt University (Nashville, Tennessee) in 1935 by professors of Biology George Gage and Harold Bold. In the 1940s and 50s the curatorship went to Dr. Elsie Quarterman, then on to Dr. R. Ben Channell. In 1965, Dr. Robert Kral inherited the herbarium of approximately 20,000 specimens and concentrated on developing the collections from Tennessee, Alabama, Florida, and Georgia, as well as the following taxonomic groups: sedges, xyrids, and grasses. In 1996 a memorandum of understanding was signed between Vanderbilt University and the Botanical Research Institute of Texas (BRIT), permanently transferring the VDB collection to BRIT in 1997. It is a priority to digitize these specimens, thus making them available to botanists for studies of the flora of the southeastern United States.
Incentives
Learn about plants of the southeastern United States and make a significant contribution to science.
Geographic Scope
Southeastern United States
Taxonomic Scope
Various vascular plant families
Temporal Scope
20th and 21st century
Language Skills Required
None
