The aim of Taxonomy Online is to use the internet as a forum to illustrate fossil specimens held in the collections of the British Geological Survey (BGS).
Introduction
These online publications do not replace traditional hardcopy palaeontological publications, but supplement them by allowing easy access to illustrations of specimens and to information about species. The descriptions of genera and species are brief, and emphasise the key features that allow differentiation between taxa, and give key information about the biostratigraphical usefulness of species and their ranges.
Digital, image-bearing databases are a powerful tool in taxonomy, but are only now becoming more widely available. It is intended that this project will make the BGS fossil collections, and in some cases those of collaborating organisations, available to geologists, and professional and amateur palaeontologists and form an important educational tool.
The Reduviasporonites gallery
This
was the first collection to be released and is part of a joint initiative
with Geoscience Australia and is a gallery of species of Reduviasporonites Wilson,
1962.
Enter
the Reduviasporonites gallery
The photograph to the left shows a scanning
electron micrograph of the Permo-Triassic microfossil Reduviasporonites
chalastus
Carboniferous spores
Taxonomy
Online 2, from the 'Bernard Owens Collection' is now available.
Enter
the Carboniferous spores gallery
The photograph to the left shows the
Carboniferous spore Convolutispora major
Further Information
Other collections coming soon are:
- Wenlock graptolites
- British Cenomanian ammonites
For more information on the taxonomy online project, contact the project leader, Ian Wilkinson.
