The museum is the showcase for the research that our institute has been carrying out for more than 170 years. Today, our research team comprises 165 scientists and dozens of scientific staff, technicians and volunteers. It is a varied team that includes biologists, ecologists, geologists, mineralogists, palaeontologists, anthropologists, oceanographers, engineers and computer experts. This enables us to carry out multidisciplinary research.
Our research strategy points out the different domains in which our scientists work. Evolution, biodiversity, ecosystems and natural resources are key words. This research sheds light on a complex and diverse world that is billions of years old. Our researchers don’t spend all their time in the lab, far from it; several hundred international expeditions are organised every year.
Our enormous collections, made up of approximately 38 million specimens, form an inexhaustible research resource. These ‘biodiversity archives’ are used to classify existing species and identify new ones, and to study their ecosystems. This research enables us to amend policies in order to protect and preserve biodiversity. And now, with new techniques such as CT scans, isotope analysis and DNA sequencing, researchers are able to glean new information from old material on a daily basis.
Multidisciplinary “integrative” taxonomic biodiversity research in a broad evolutionary perspective. As such the OD T&Ph conducts research in the following fields: alpha-taxonomy (species descriptions), anatomy (including histology and ultrastructural research), morphometrics, faunistics, (behavioural) ecology, zoogeography, population genetics, and phylogeny, including DNA barcoding. These research activities are done in the context of more specific research interests, many of which relate to grand societal challenges such as climate change, invasive species, habitat fragmentation, environmental pollution, animal conservation, forensics, vector control, agricultural practices, and public education and awareness (including countering anti-evolutionary thinking). As such the OD T&Ph attempts to combine fundamental and applied taxonomic biodiversity research.
