Delaware State University

Delaware State University will increase operational efficiency and improve collections care and management of the 220,000 physical specimens in the Claude E. Phillips Herbarium, which includes vascular and non-vascular plants fungi, fossils, wood, fiber, and other biocultural artifacts. Project activities include curating the vascular plant collection and association database to update their nomenclature and completing a physical reorganization of the collections based on the database updates to improve collections care and management. The project will involve hiring a full-time curatorial assistant to complete the taxonomic reconciliation, annotation, database quality control, and physical rearrangement. The outcome of project activities will include updated nomenclature and classification along with more accurate information in the database that will increase data discoverability and utilization for research, education, policymaking, and outreach. Students involved in the project will acquire new skills in terms of specimen preparation and gain better understanding of the need and the use of natural history collections.