Type hunting in the shadow of Cherbonnier
The Musée national d’Histoire naturelle in Paris (MNHN) is home to one of the richest collections of holothuroids in the world. Famous workers such as Lesson (xx-yy), Quoy & Gaimard (xx-yy), Perrier (xx-yy) and most notably Cherbonnier (1909-1995) used these collections to feed their influential papers.
Overall, the MNHN holds the types for nearly 50 different aspidochirotid species. The Paris museum is also home to one of the most complete microscopic slide collections with ossicles stemming from type specimens from all over the world.
During our five day stay we examined some xx type specimens , took nearly yy pictures and sampled some zz tissue samples for further analysis of the ossicle assemblages.
Funding for came from Synthesys (Samyn & Massin) and from the PEET project (VandenSpiegel).
