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The Natural History Museum is an international leader in the study of the natural world. Our science describes the diversity of nature, promotes an understanding of its past, and supports the anticipation and management of the impact of human activity on the environment.
The Museum's repository provides free access to publications produced by more than 300 scientists working here. Researchers at the Museum study a diverse range of issues, including threats to Earth's biodiversity, the maintenance of delicate ecosystems, environmental pollution and disease. The accessible repository showcases this broad research output.
The repository was launched in 2016 with an initially modest number of journal publications in its database. It now includes book chapters and blogs from Museum scientists.
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Bryozoa from the Maastrichtian Korojon Formation, Western AustraliaThe first Australian Cretaceous bryozoan fauna is described from the Upper Campanian – Lower Maastrichtian Korojon Formation from the Giralia Anticline in north-western Western Australia. Bryozoans are the numerically dominant element in a sclerobiont community dependent on the abundant large inoceramids, utilizing both valves in life position as well as reworked shell fragments. A total of 68 species-level taxa are described (22 cyclostomes and 46 cheilostomes); 50 of these are new (12 cyclos-tomes and 38 cheilostomes) and the remaining 18 taxa are left at various levels of open nomenclature. They are referred to 47 genera (14 cyclostome and 33 cheilostome genera, 11 of which are new), with a total of 10 taxa left in open nomenclature. One new family, Cardabiellidae, is introduced. The total Late Cretaceous bryozoan fauna known from the Southern Hemisphere remnants of the Gondwana supercontinent – South America, Africa, India, Antarctica, Australia, Zealandia – is significantly less diverse than that known from the Northern Hemisphere, where the European Chalk Sea fauna constitutes the diversity hotspot. The addition of the Korojon fauna described here expands our knowledge of the Cretaceous bryozoan fauna from the Southern Hemisphere considerably, particularly with respect to the youngest bryozoan order, the Cheilostomata. And importantly, the Korojon fauna, more than doubles the proportion of Late Cretaceous cheilostome genera endemic to the Southern Hemisphere from 12.5% to more than 25% of the total number of Late Cretaceous genera presently known from this realm. We suggest that this significant expansion may well warrant a reassessment of the role of Southern Hemisphere bryozoan faunas in the recovery from the Cretaceous-Paleogene biotic turnover.
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Convergent evolution of plant prickles by repeated gene co-option over deep timeAn enduring question in evolutionary biology concerns the degree to which episodes of convergent trait evolution depend on the same genetic programs, particularly over long timescales. In this work, we genetically dissected repeated origins and losses of prickles—sharp epidermal projections—that convergently evolved in numerous plant lineages. Mutations in a cytokinin hormone biosynthetic gene caused at least 16 independent losses of prickles in eggplants and wild relatives in the genus <jats:italic>Solanum</jats:italic> . Homologs underlie prickle formation across angiosperms that collectively diverged more than 150 million years ago, including rice and roses. By developing new <jats:italic>Solanum</jats:italic> genetic systems, we leveraged this discovery to eliminate prickles in a wild species and an indigenously foraged berry. Our findings implicate a shared hormone activation genetic program underlying evolutionarily widespread and recurrent instances of plant morphological innovation.
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A crowd-sourced genomic project to assess hybrid content in a rare avian vagrant (Azure Tit Cyanistes cyanus (Pallas, 1770))The aim of this study was to correlate plumage variation with the amount of genomic hybrid content in hybrids between Azure Tits Cyanistes cyanus (Pallas, 1770) and European Blue Tit Cyanistes caeruleus (Linnaeus, 1758), by re-sequencing the genomes of museum specimens of non-hybrids and presumed hybrids with varying plumages. The project was funded by crowdsourcing and initiated when two presumed Azure Tits, observed by hundreds of Swedish birdwatchers, were rejected as hybrids based on minor plumage deviations assumed to indicate hybrid contents from the European Blue Tit. The results confirm that hybrids with intermediate plumages, so called Pleske’s Tits, are first generation hybrids (F1 hybrids). Individuals, whose plumages are similar to Azure Tits, but assessed as hybrids based on minor plumage deviations, are all backcrosses but vary in their degree of hybrid content. However, some individuals morphologically recognized as pure Azure Tits expressed similar degrees of hybrid content. The results indicate that: (1) hybrid content may be widespread in Azure Tits in the western part of its habitat distribution; (2) plumage deviation in backcrosses is not linearly correlated with the genetic degree of hybrid origin; and (3) all Azure Tits observed in Europe outside its natural distribution may have some degree of hybrid origin. We therefore suggest that it is very difficult to phenotypically single out hybrids beyond first generation backcrosses. We argue that decreased sequencing costs and improved analytical tools open the doors for museomic crowd-sourced projects that may not address outstanding biological questions but have a major interest for lay citizens such as birdwatchers.
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The Founding Feathers: the true ancestry of the domestic Barbary DoveIn 2008 the International Commission for Zoological Nomenclature (ICZN) ruled that the name Streptopelia risoria (Linnaeus, 1758) should have priority for both African Collared Dove and its domestic form, Barbary Dove, as it is senior to S. roseogrisea (Sundevall, 1857). Many ignored the ruling in the belief that the ancestry of Barbary Dove is still unproven. Given the lack of a namebearing specimen and in anticipation of the ICZN decision, in 2008 a neotype was designated for S. risoria. To clarify the taxonomic status of roseogrisea, as its original type series was mixed, in 2018 a neotype was also designated for this junior synonym of African Collared Dove. As the species was assumed to be polytypic, synonymisation of roseogrisea with risoria at species level was questioned thereafter. The results of a whole genome-resequencing study now show that African Collared Dove is the principal ancestor of Barbary Dove, and that the species is monotypic.
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Remarks on the types of the New Guinea endemic Otidiphaps Gould, 1870We detail the types and some other early specimens of the four taxa currently usually treated as subspecies of the New Guinea endemic, Pheasant Pigeon Otidiphaps nobilis. This material has been subject to a number of erroneous statements in the previous literature. In chronological order of description, O. n. nobilis Gould, 1870, was based on a single specimen of unknown provenance and collector, now at the Natural History Museum, Tring; O. n. cervicalis E. P. Ramsay, 1880, and its objective junior synonym O. n. regalis Salvin & Godman, 1880, were based on multiple syntypes taken in 1879 (several of them the same specimens), all held in Tring (despite being previously reported as such, two specimens in Sydney appear to have no name-bearing status); O. n. insularis Salvin and Godman, 1883, is known from the two syntypes, collected in 1882 and held in Tring, and just one other specimen, taken in 1896 and held in the American Museum of Natural History, New York; and O. n. aruensis Rothschild, 1928, was based on a specimen collected in June 1914, now in New York, although there is a significantly earlier specimen of this taxon in the Museum Heineanum Halberstadt.
