Geological Society of America

T35 Digital Technology in Real and Virtual Geoscience Experiences (Posters)

Sunday, 1 November 2015
9:00 AM - 5:30 PM
Exhibit Hall

DIGITIZATION, RESEARCH TOOL, AND EDUCATIONAL WEBSITE: THE VIRTUAL SILURIAN REEF, A MODEL FOR STREAMLINE WEB DEVELOPMENT USING A DATABASE

Paper number: T35-11
Program: Technical Sessions
Time: 9:00 AM – 5:30 PM

Authors

Paul Mayer Presenting Author
Gantz Family Collection Center, Chicago, IL
Patricia Coorough Burke
Milwaukee Public Museum, Milwaukee, WI
Pete Herbst
The Field Museum, Chicago, IL
Kate Webbink
The Field Museum, Chicago, IL
Marc Lambruschi
The Field Museum, Chicago, IL
Sharon Grant
The Field Museum, Chicago, IL

Abstract

The Milwaukee Public Museum in partnership with the Field Museum is nearing completion of a 3-year IMLS sponsored project to digitize Silurian fossils of the upper Midwest. The first goal of this project is to produce an online database for researchers to search collections at both institutions. Over 34,000 specimen and locality records and 40,000 images from the MPM and FMNH have been added to a shared EMu database that is accessible online. Shared between the institutions in the database are 12,500 taxonomic records, 2,998 lithostratigraphic records, and 1,853 chronostratigraphic records.

The second goal is to revise and update the Virtual Silurian Reef (VSR) website. The VSR is an educational outreach website designed for middle school students and teachers. It explains the significance of these fossil reefs that were the largest biological structures and the richest biodiversity communities the world had produced up until this time. It uses these fossils as a tool to introduce concepts of evolution, plate tectonics, environmental change, and measuring biodiversity through time.

The Virtual Silurian Reef website has been redesigned with all the data stored in the EMu collections management software, and the previous websites structure has been mapped to EMu’s Narratives Module. The webpages are generated from the database using the IMu EMu API. This simplifies the process of web development. The IMu API connects a field in EMu to a location on a web page allowing any update in EMu to be publish directly to the website. From the data entry to final website product, this approach can help save time and effort while making collections and research more accessible to the public.