Thematic Collections Networks

Each Thematic Collections Network (TCN) is a network of institutions with a strategy for digitizing information that addresses a particular research theme, such as impacts of climate change or biota of a region. Once digitized, data are easily accessed and available for other research and educational use. Other institutions and collections may join an existing TCN as a Partner to Existing Network (PEN). The following are the TCNs, and any associated PENs, currently funded by the Advancing Digitization of Biodiversity Collections (ADBC) project:

Award Year 2019

• (TCN) Digitizing collections to trace parasite-host associations and predict the spread of vector-borne disease: (TPT)
• (TCN) American Crossroads: Digitizing the Vascular Flora of the South-Central United States: (TORCH)
• (TCN) Enhancing Access to Taxonomic and Biogeographical Data to Stem the Tide of Extinction of the Highly Imperiled Pacific Island Land Snails: (PILSBRY)

Award Year 2018

• (TCN) Capturing California's Flowers: Using Digital Images to Investigate Phenological Change in a Biodiversity Hotspot (CAP)
• (TCN) The Pteridological Collections Consortium: An Integrative Approach to Pteridophyte Diversity Over the Last 420 Million Years (PCC)
• (TCN) Digitizing "Endless Forms": Facilitating Research on Imperiled Plants with Extreme Morphologies (Endless Forms)

Award Year 2017:

• (TCN) Using Herbarium Data to Document Plant Niches in the High Peaks and High Plains of the Southern Rockies - Past, Present, and Future (SoRo)
  • (PEN) 2019 Enhancing the SoRo TCN with collections of taxonomic, geographic, and historic significance from the Rancho Santa Ana Botanic Garden Herbarium
• (TCN) oVert: Open Exploration of Vertebrate Diversity in 3D (oVert)
  • (PEN) 2018 oMEGA - Online Metrology of Extant Giant Animals for the oVert TCN
  • (PEN) 2019 Functional Quantitative Characters for Ecology and Evolution (FuncQEE)
  • (PEN) 2019 The oUTCT PEN: Outwardly Mobilizing the UTCT Vertebrate Archive for Research and Training

Award Year 2016:

• (TCN) The Cretaceous World: Digitizing Fossils to Reconstruct Evolving Ecosystems in the Western Interior Seaway (Cretaceous World)
  • (PEN) 2017 Expanding and enhancing a TCN digitizing fossils to reconstruct evolving ecosystems the Cretaceous Western Interior Seaway
  • (PEN) 2019 The Cretaceous World: Connecting the Cretaceous Seas of North America
• (TCN) Lepidoptera of North America Network: Documenting Diversity in the Largest Clade of Herbivores (LepNet)
  • (PEN) 2019 Integration of data from the San Diego Natural History Museum with the Lepidoptera of North America Network
• (TCN) The Mid-Atlantic Megalopolis: Achieving a greater scientific understanding of our urban world (MAM)
  • (PEN) 2017 Partnering the Penn State Herbarium (PAC) to Contextualize the Mid-Atlantic Megalopolis
  • (PEN) 2018 Connecting Rust Belt Dynamics to the Mid-Atlantic Magalopolis Utilizing the Carnegie Museum Herbarium

Award Year 2015:

• (TCN) The Microfungi Collections Consortium: A Networked Approach to Digitizing Small Fungi with Large Impacts on the Function and Health of Ecosystems​ (MiCC)
• (TCN) Documenting Fossil Marine Invertebrate Communities of the Eastern Pacific - Faunal Responses to Environmental Change over the last 66 million years​ (EPICC)
  • (PEN) 2018 Enhancing the EPICC TCN with Unique, Well-Curated but Poorly Accessible Collections at the University of California - Riverside
  • (PEN) 2019 Critical Central and South American additions to the EPICC TCN from the oldest Invertebrate Paleontology collection in the United States

Award Year 2014:

• (TCN) Documenting the Occurrence through Space and Time of Aquatic Non-indigenous Fish, Mollusks, Algae, and Plants Threatening North America's Great Lakes (GLI)
• (TCN) InvertEBase: Reaching Back to See the Future: Species-rich Invertebrate Faunas Document Causes and Consequences of Biodiversity Shifts (InvertEBase)
  • (PEN) 2016 Augmenting the temporal and geographic range of InvertEBase through additional collaboration of the Chicago Academy of Sciences
  • (PEN) 2018 Mollusca and Arthropoda Biodiversity in the Colorado Plateau Region
• (TCN) The Key to the Cabinets: Building and Sustaining a Research Database for a Global Biodiversity Hotspot (SERNEC)
  • (PEN) 2017 Integrating the herbaria of peninsular Florida, a biodiversity hotspot of endemism, rarity, and richness
  • (PEN) 2018 Filling in Knowledge Gaps with Key Herbaria for Understanding Vascular Plant Diversity in the Atlantic Coastal Plain

Award Year 2013:

• (TCN) Fossil Insect Collaborative: A Deep-Time Approach to Studying Diversification and Response to Environmental Change (FIC)
  • (PEN) 2015 Partnership to the Fossil Insect Collaborative for Collections at the University of California Museum of Paleontology
  • (PEN) 2017 Digitizing the Fossil Insects of LA: Critical Additions to the Fossil Insect Collaborative
• (TCN) Developing a Centralized Digital Archive of Vouchered Animal Communication Signals (VACS)
• (TCN) The Macroalgal Herbarium Consortium: Accessing 150 Years of Specimen Data to Understand Changes in the Marine/Aquatic Environment (MHC)

Award Year 2012:

• (TCN) Mobilizing New England Vascular Plant Specimen Data to Track Environmental Change (NEVP)
  • (PEN) 2015 Partnership to the New England Vascular Plant Network for the University of Maine Herbarium
  • (PEN) 2015 Partnership to the Existing New England Vascular Plant Network for Collections at the New York Botanical Garden
• (TCN) Digitizing Fossils to Enable New Syntheses in Biogeography- Creating a PALEONICHES (Paleoniches)
  • (PEN) 2013 Targeted Digitization to Expand and Enhance the PALEONICHES TCN
  • (PEN) 2013 Increasing the Robustness of the Ordovician and Pennsylvanian Dataset of PALEONICHES-TCN
  • (PEN) 2017 Digitization PEN: Paleoniches on the western Cincinnati arch, the Ordovician of Indiana
• (TCN) The Macrofungi Collection Consortium: Unlocking a Biodiversity Resource for Understanding Biotic Interactions, Nutrient Cycling and Human Affairs (MaCC)
  • (PEN) 2014 Partnership to Existing Macrofungi Collection Consortium--Digitization of an Important Regional Collection of Macrofungi at the Pringle Herbarium
  • (PEN) 2015 Partnership to the Macrofungi Collection Consortium for the Richard Homola Mycological Herbarium
• (TCN) Symbiota Collections of Arthropods Network (SCAN): A Model for Collections Digitization to Promote Taxonomic and Ecological Research
  • (PEN) 2013 Facilitating a Shared Image Library and Occurrence Database for Ants of the Southwest as Part of the SCAN TCN
  • (PEN) 2014 Ground-dwelling Insects in the Brigham Young University Collection, Enhancement to SCAN
  • (PEN) 2015 Integration of data from the Triplehorn Insect Collection with the Southwestern Collections of Arthropods Network
  • (PEN) 2016 The addition of OrthopNet to SCAN
  • (PEN) 2017 Incorporation of a Massive New World Invertebrate Collection at the University of Texas at El Paso
  • (PEN) 2018 Field Museum of Natural History Partnership with the Southwest Collection of Arthropods Network

Award Year 2011:

• (TCN) InvertNet: An Integrative Platform for Research on Environmental Change, Species Discovery and Identification
  • (PEN) 2013 Digitizing the University of Iowa Museum of Natural History's Historic Invertebrate Collections through the InvertNet TCN
• (TCN) Plants, Herbivores and Parasitoids: A Model System for the Study of Tri-Trophic Associations (TTD)
• (TCN) North American Lichens and Bryophytes: Sensitive Indicators of Environmental Quality and Change (LBCC)
  • (PEN) 2012 Digitization of North American Bryophyte and Lichen Specimens from Florida Herbaria
  • (PEN) 2012 Addressing Colorado Lichens and Bryophytes as Sensitive Indicators of Environmental Quality and Change
  • (PEN) 2013 Digitization of Two Important Medium-sized Collections to Join the North American Bryophytes and Lichens TCN
  • (PEN) 2014 Digitization of North American Bryophyte and Lichen Specimens from Two Ohio Herbaria at the University of Cincinnati (CINC)