Subproject of the project Collection Discovery and Development
What new research opportunities arise when scientists from all over the world can digitally access the collection objects? What knowledge can be generated by using state-of-the-art imaging and chemistry techniques? In the Collection-based Research subproject, we aim to demonstrate the variety of potential that can be tapped by indexing and developing the collections.
In the summer of 2020, the museum management issued a "Call for Ideas", inviting all museum employees to generate innovative approaches to indexing the collection in a research-driven way. We refer to these approaches as “lighthouses”. This Call resulted in more than 40 ideas to tackle topics of societal relevance, including meteorite analysis to investigate the early solar system, the documentation of changing biodiversity in urban areas, and a reflection on museum-related and scientific working methods within a global context.
Most of these ideas were sorted into six interdisciplinary and modular research clusters with overarching themes:
We used seed money to generate the necessary infrastructure and resources to develop these ideas, before implementing them as projects funded by third parties via competitive funding programs. This subproject is the interface to the museum’s current collection-related research programs, allowing us to organize and coordinate these research clusters and their projects. We work with the scientists to make our research visible to the general public.
In addition, we support the Collection Discovery and Development from the perspective of basic research. We are in direct contact with the other subprojects Transformation, Information Management, and Access, Innovation, and Networking. We pool the substantive requirements of the museum’s various research disciplines and research partners, pass on the impulses, and ensure that the entire indexing and development process is closely intertwined with research.