Image: The skull of Toxodon, an extinct South American mammal collected by Charles Darwin during the voyage of HMS Beagle © Trustees of the Natural History Museum, London
by Alice Gibson
Would you like to explore the fossil mammals that helped shape Charles Darwin’s theory of evolution, alongside historically significant natural history illustrations and archives, as well as centuries of scientific collections? The Heritage Science Data Service (HSDS) will help make these connections possible.
Uncovering the Connections That Bring Collections to Life
While DiSSCo UK is our 10-year national programme to digitise and connect specimens from UK natural science collections, the Heritage Science Data Catalogue brings together collections, archives and research data that reveal connections between people and the natural world.
Funded by the Arts and Humanities Research Council and delivered by a consortium of partners led by the Archaeology Data Service, the HSDS provides the tools, services and expertise needed to support heritage science and conservation research.
Through its catalogue, repository, research tools and specialist services, it helps researchers, conservators and heritage professionals preserve, manage and better understand the UK’s cultural and natural heritage.
Building a National Heritage Science Resource
Resources from the Natural History Museum are now available through the Heritage Science Data Catalogue and include Charles Darwin’s fossil mammal collection, archaeological reference material and long-term environmental records
Darwin’s Fossil Mammals, from South America, were crucial to the development of his theories of evolution, which revolutionised scientific understanding of the natural world and still informs our understanding of how life on Earth changed over time. While access to these physical collections is restricted due to their fragility, they have been scanned with 3D laser scanners to provide a digitised version of the specimens for researchers and the public to explore.
Anna Atkins’ Photographs of British Algae: Cyanotype Impressions (1843) is widely regarded as the first book illustrated with photographic images. Using light-sensitive chemicals and botanical specimens, Atkins created striking cyanotypes that demonstrate how collections have been recorded.
Her pioneering use of this new photographic technique was groundbreaking, and her work continues to inspire new generations of scientists, photographers and artists. The Museum’s 3 volume set of her work has been digitised and is openly available online, alongside many other collections from the Museum’s Library and Archives.
Together, these resources reveal far more than the history of individual specimens. They tell stories about how people have collected, studied and understood the natural world, and how our relationships with plants, animals and environments have changed over time.
Explore the collection
These resources can now be explored through the Museum’s Heritage Science collection and the Heritage Science Data Catalogue, allowing researchers and the public to discover the wider stories and contexts behind specimens.
The catalogue will also connect users with materials from the Museum’s Library and Archives, including illustrations, photographs and manuscripts that help bring collections to life. The Museum’s Library and Archives collections of natural history drawings, printed works, archives and correspondence span more than 400 years and chart how we visualise and understand the natural world. Digitising these collections helps ensure they remain accessible for future generations while their inclusion in the Heritage Science Data Catalogue further unlocks their research potential and contextualises them within the rich discipline of Heritage Science. It offers new ways to understand heritage, the history of collecting and humanity’s changing relationship with the natural world.
If you manage collections, archives or datasets that could support heritage or conservation research then we would love to know what you think of the new service. We would also like to hear from organisations whose resources fall outside the scope of DiSSCo UK but could contribute to understanding, interpreting or managing heritage.
To let us know your thoughts, contact help@hsds.ac.uk.