For botanists, herbariums — collections of preserved plant specimens and associated data — are a source of valuable research and information, capable of preserving plant specimens for more than a hundred years. Till recently, the only way to learn about the 45,000 specimens of medicinal plants at the Foundation for the Revitalisation of Local Health (FRLH) was to visit the herbarium in person. The herbarium is located at the Transdisplinary University near Yelahanka.
However, a group of 25 students, teachers and researchers on Tuesday made this easier by adding data on 600 plants to an online repository of plant specimens. This was part of WeDigBio 2016, an initiative held in institutes across the world to make scientific data on plants accessible to everyone. The Union government-supported FRLH herbarium has more than 89 per cent of the specimens included in the Indian Systems of Medicine.
Greater accessibility
The institute first uploaded herbarium sheets (containing dried parts of plants) of 1,300 species, based on which participants fed data into the online database, said Noorunnisa Begum, curator of the herbarium. “The aim is to make information on medicinal plants easily accessible to anyone anywhere. Using the online database makes it easy to study a particular group of plants, say of the Western Ghats,” said Dr. Begum.
Gokul, a post-doctoral fellow at the Central Institute of Medicinal and Aromatic Plants, Bengaluru, who participated in the event, said, “The FLRH herbarium has specimens collected from up to a hundred years back, some from areas which have now been urbanised. Studying these plants shows the effect of urbanisation, and gives more information about changes in the ecosystem over the years.”
He added that digitisation of records will help botanists like him access information on plant specimens easily without having to visit multiple institutions.
The other collaborating institutions for WeDigBio 2016 are Southeast Regional Network of Expertise and Collections (SERNEC), Natural History Museum, University of Florida, Florida Museum, National Science Foundation (NSF), California Terrestrial Arthropod Database, and Florida State University.
Using the online database makes it easy to study a particular group of plants, say of the Western Ghats.
Noorunnisa Begum,curator, FRLH herbarium
