The Department of Natural History at the Florida Museum, University of Florida, employs 29 faculty-curators and and more than 50 collection managers and other professional staff who pursue a variety of scientific questions within the anthropological, biological, and paleontological sciences.
Training the Next Generation of Scientists
Each year, the Department houses a vibrant and diverse community of 80–100 graduate students, 20–30 postdoctoral researchers, and >200 undergraduate students who are trained in our collections and research labs. Our faculty, associated staff, and students typically produce more than 200 peer-reviewed scientific publications and teach more than 40 university courses each academic year.
Documenting Biodiversity and Cultural Heritage
Additionally, faculty-curators supervise the growth and maintenance of scientific collections containing more than 40 million specimens of modern and fossil plants, animals, and archaeological and ethnographic materials – one of the largest such university-based resources in the world. Housed in the Florida Museum of Natural History (the official natural history museum of the state of Florida), these collections were initiated over a century ago and continue to grow rapidly. The collections house materials assembled from all over the world and are of inestimable value to understanding the history of life on earth.
Exceptional Productivity
The Department had an outstanding year with our faculty and staff overseeing about $9.5 million in expenditures for research and collection activities, including about $7.5 million in state and federal grants, and received 19 new grants totaling >$4 million. This per-capita funding rate is high, even for a research-intensive university like the University of Florida.
Latest Research News
Caribbean islands were once the center of diversity for barn owls
Key points Barn owls dispersed to North America from Eurasia between the Pliocene and early Pleistocene epochs, less than 5…
Archaeologists uncover centuries-old mystery of Tampa Bay’s secret community of migrant potters
Key Points Archaeologists have debated for decades over how Mississippian-style pottery ended up in Tampa Bay, an area long left…
It took 3.7 billion years for this genome to evolve. UF students assembled it in one semester
Key points Eleven undergraduate students at the University of Florida are the first to assemble the pignut hickory tree genome.…
Department of Natural History Bylaws
These bylaws are intended to establish the general principles in order to guide the governance of the Department of Natural History of the Florida Museum of Natural History.
View Department Bylaws