The New York Botanical Garden
+
KE EMu
Melissa Tulig
Botanical Information Management
NYBG + KE EMu
NYBG + KE EMu
2002: search for a database begins
• Herbarium specimen database (600,000 records)
• Taxonomy, geography, person authority files
• 25 separate curator specimen databases (dbase,
Access, Excel)
• Index Herbariorum
• 2 Herbarium loans applications
• Index to American Botanical Literature (Access)
• Structured Use data (Economic Botany)
• 10,000 Bulk Sample collections (with vouchered
herbarium specimens)
• 100,000 specimen images
NYBG + KE EMu
user needs
• 50 daily concurrent users - full-time staff
plus interns, volunteers, grad students
• Different permissions for individual users
or groups of users
• Record-level security on certain record
types
• Instant web access to the live database for
online users
NYBG + KE EMu
technical staff
• IT department of 4 people for 400 Garden
employees
• No programmers
NYBG + KE EMu
options
• Develop software in-house
• Use free software for specimen database,
build applications for other data sets
• Purchase Digital Asset Management
software for images
• Purchase a customizable system to do it
all
NYBG + KE EMu
the winner is…EMu
• Object-oriented database comprised of various
“modules” for data entry
• Registry Module: view, edit, insert and delete
rights settings based by user, group, module, or
field
• Lookup Lists Module: allows you to standardize
any look up list, keep them locked or open to
users to edit
• Audit Module: track all changes made by users
and reverse any edits
NYBG + KE EMu
Catalogue Module
Taxonomy Module
herbarium specimens,Bulk
Samples, Use data
Loans/Movements
scientific names, synonymy,
descriptions
Sites Module
geographic data and
georeferencing fields
tracks all herbarium loans
& shipments
Bibliography
Collection Events
field book data
citations from IABL
Parties Module
Multimedia Module
person authority files and
Index Herbariorum
images
NYBG + KE EMu
have a look
NYBG + KE EMu
NYBG + KE EMu
web interface
• Integrated web interface directly to our live
EMu database via PHP
• Added Google Maps and the FSI Viewer
• All edits to records and new records and
images go live instantly (but this can be
controlled by user)
• Multiple interfaces and designs to different
modules for different projects
NYBG + KE EMu
that was 2005, this is now
• Import data as csv or xml, new import appends
data to existing records
• Export data as text, spreadsheets
• Export formatted reports directly from Emu via
Crystal Reports (specimen label, loans invoices)
• DarwinCore backend fields
• Record Templates – using it for bulk data entry
of fieldbooks and barcode sequences
NYBG + KE EMu
EMu natural history users
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Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History
Natural History Museum, London
Museum Victoria
Royal Botanic Gardens, Sydney
American Museum of Natural History
Peabody Museum of Natural History at Yale
Field Museum
NYBG + KE EMu
positives
• KE will create whatever you want them to create
• You receive all modules and we constantly find
new uses for ones we didn’t originally use
– Two weeks ago we started tracking Herbarium visitors
in Emu and publishing weekly visitor reports
• Receive all new features – Record Templates
• User Support – if anything breaks, you call KE
and they fix it.
NYBG + KE EMu
negatives
• KE will create whatever you want them to
create
• Large up-front cost (depending on
customization) and yearly maintenance
fees by number of user licenses
• Steep learning curve
NYBG + KE EMu
collections management to
research management
• DNA Aliquots, Tissue Samples, Structural
Botany collections (linked to vouchered
herbarium specimens)
• Use data from the Institute of Economic
Botany
• Electronic floras and monographs with
separate web interfaces
NYBG + KE EMu
not just for herbarium sheets anymore
NYBG + KE EMu
a day in the life of NYBG & EMu
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Incoming shipment from the field logged in movements module
Staff enter specimen records using fieldbook template
Tissue samples catalogued, linked to voucher specimen and sent to lab
Labels for herbarium specimens and tissue collections printed from EMu
Gifts for determination are sent to other institutions and tracked in loans
module
Determinations are returned and entered in the catalogue
Determined specimens are mounted, barcoded, imaged (instantly in the VH)
and filed in the herbarium
Digital images from the field mass imported to Emu, linked to specimen
record if imaged before pressed or linked to species record
Descriptions of species added to floras module
DNA Aliquots are made from collected tissue samples, published in
research papers
GenBank IDs are added to EMu
NYBG + KE EMu
new features for next release
• Export data formatted for ArcExplorer
• OpenLayers mapping
• IMu - KE's new web interface
– XML>XSLT> HTML
– Display of results from multiple modules
– Customisable interface via XSLT
NYBG + KE EMu
today
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1.3 million specimen records
360,000 taxonomy authority files
340,000 images
80,000 person files (authors, collectors,
determiners)
15,000 IH records
200,000 bibliographic records
10,000 DNA Aliquot &Tissue Sample records
21,000 loans (265 e-loans)
20 electronic floras & monographs projects
NYBG + KE EMu