Integrated use of enhanced natural history collections is key to solve the biodiversity crisis

Global biodiversity loss is arguably the biggest problem facing humanity. Climate change, changes in land and sea use and other factors are synergistically eroding biodiversity to an unprecedented speed and extent, with cascading impacts on humanity and our livelihoods. Scientific advice on safeguarding biodiversity depends on all available information to understand past and current developments, and predict future responses of Earth’s ecosystems. This challenge requires integrative research across space, time, methods, and taxa, and integration of these data into a new generation of biodiversity models. Such research is currently thwarted because biodiversity data are stored in different formats and databases, and the largest sources of biodiversity data are still contained in physical repositories that are not fully accessible: collections of geological and biological specimens. To overcome this shortfall, natural history collections must be developed into specimen-based, integrated, and digitally accessible research platforms. We propose that a new conceptual framework, Collectomics, is required to underpin this vision; this aegis embraces the entirety of collection-based research, although we focus here on how it enables and fuels the research necessary to effectively confront the Anthropocene biodiversity crisis. Current technological developments provide an unprecedented opportunity to unleash the full potential of collections by fully integrating the myriad data dimensions from collection objects (manuscript submitted to PNAS on 6th April 2021, full manuscript available for download).