The United States National Herbarium is a collection of five million preserved plant specimens housed in the Department of

Botany Botany, also called , plant biology or phytology, is the science of plant life and a branch of biology. A botanist, plant scientist or phytologist is a scientist who specialises in this field. The term "botany" comes from the Ancient Greek w ...

at the

National Museum of Natural History The National Museum of Natural History is a natural history museum administered by the Smithsonian Institution, located on the National Mall in Washington, D.C., United States. It has free admission and is open 364 days a year. In 2021, with 7 ...

, which is part of the

Smithsonian Institution The Smithsonian Institution ( ), or simply the Smithsonian, is a group of museums and education and research centers, the largest such complex in the world, created by the U.S. government "for the increase and diffusion of knowledge". Founded ...

. It represents about 8% of the plant collection resources of the United States and is one of the ten largest herbaria in the world. The

herbarium A herbarium (plural: herbaria) is a collection of preserved plant specimens and associated data used for scientific study. The specimens may be whole plants or plant parts; these will usually be in dried form mounted on a sheet of paper (called ...

was founded in 1848, when the first collections were accessioned from the

United States Exploring Expedition The United States Exploring Expedition of 1838–1842 was an exploring and surveying expedition of the Pacific Ocean and surrounding lands conducted by the United States. The original appointed commanding officer was Commodore Thomas ap Catesby ...

, when botanists pressed approximately 50,000 specimens, representing 10,000 species of plants. The '' Index Herbariorum'' code assigned to this herbarium is US and this abbreviation is used when citing housed specimens.

References

External links

{{Authority control Herbaria in the United States Smithsonian Institution