Malacology
Malacology, the study of mollusks, has been part of the Academy since its founding in 1812. Thomas Say (1787-1834), Isaac Lea (1792-1886), Samuel S. Haldemann (1812-1880), George W. Tryon, Jr. (1838-1888), Henry A. Pilsbry (1862-1957), H. B. Baker (1889-1971), and R. Tucker Abbott are some of the more notable malacologists associated with the Academy.
The collection of recent mollusks at The Academy of Natural Sciences of Philadelphia (ANSP) is the oldest in the country, and the second largest catalogued one in the world. It currently has more than 430,000 catalogued lots containing about 10 million specimens, including 30,000-35,000 lots preserved in ethanol. Type specimens of more than 400 authors are represented in more than 12,000 type lots. ANSP has specimens from all over the world. Greatest strengths are in shallow-water marine mollusks from the tropical Indo-Pacific and the Western Atlantic and worldwide freshwater and land mollusks.
The Malacology Department maintains its own research website. This site hosts a number of Malacology collection and research databases. More information can be found via the following (external) links:
- Malacology Research website
- Malacology Collections Catalog
- Malacolog 4.1: Names applied to mollusc from the Western Atlantic
- Malacology Georeferencing Project: Geographic referencing of the Academy's Malacology Collection
- The Mussel Project:Global revision of freshwater mussels
- OBIS IndoPacific Mollusc Database: Species names and distributions of IndoPacific molluscs
