The University of Alaska Museum of the North\'s Genomic Resources facility contains over 200,000 tissue samples from voucher specimens archived in the Mammalogy, Ornithology, Ichthyology and Entomology collections. Collection holdings can be searched on Arctos, a Collaborative Collection Management Solution. The geographic and taxonomic composition of the tissue collection is largely determined by the research interests of the museum curators and other local and regional biologists conducting research that involves specimen collection. It is the largest collection of such material from Alaskan species, with tissue samples dating back to 1936, though preserving fresh tissue did not become standard practice until the early 1990s. The storage facility consists of eight liquid nitrogen-cooled cryovats that maintain vapor-phase nitrogen at -170C (-274F).

Collection Coverage

Access rights

All tissue grants are approved by individual collections. Please see the appropriate collection’s webpage for information on requesting specimen loans and tissue grants. Qualified researchers may request limited grants of tissue from UAM. Use of these samples depletes them. Guidelines for requesting tissue grants have been developed to ensure both short- and long-term availability and integrity of these irreplaceable resources. Tissue grants are intended to supplement material previously obtained through collecting and/or loans from other museums, not to provide all the samples necessary for any project.

Institution Codes

Rights

Please see the appropriate collection’s webpage for information on collection rights.