One of the ten largest natural science collections in the world.
COLLECTIONS OF THE ROYAL BELGIAN INSTITUTE OF NATURAL SCIENCES
With 38 million specimens, the Royal Belgian Institute of Natural Sciences (RBINS) has one of the ten largest natural science collections in the world, and the third largest in Europe after Paris and London. Its treasures include the Iguanodons of Bernissart, the Neanderthal of Spy, the shell collection of Dautzenberg, the four lunar rock fragments, the Tasmanian wolf or the insect collection of Baron De Selys Longchamps. The result of decades of exploration and research, the collections, with modern technologies, allow us to increase our knowledge of the history of our planet, its biodiversity... and the best ways to protect it.
The collections are divided into six main themes:
- Entomology: The collection of insects, spiders, mites and centipedes of the Royal Belgian Institute of Natural Sciences comprises between 15 and 17 million specimens. The collections include most of the known orders and include at least 15,000 type specimens. These are unique specimens that are used to describe a species and are therefore very important reference material. In the last ten years, the collections have been enriched by about 1,000 'types'.
- Recent invertebrates: The "Recent Invertebrates" collection includes nearly 15 million specimens and tissues belonging to current species or species that became extinct during the Quaternary (2.6 million years ago to the present). However, the collection does not include insects, arachnids and terrestrial myriapods, which are grouped elsewhere in the Entomology Collection.
- Recent vertebrates: The collection of recent vertebrates is historically the oldest in our Institute. At the beginning, that is to say in the middle of the 19th century, it consisted mainly of native and tropical birds. It now includes 600,000 specimens of birds, fish, amphibians, reptiles and mammals.
- Anthropology: The collections of Anthropology and Prehistory include archaeological objects and anthropological specimens.
- Paleontology: The Palaeontology collections are among the oldest in the Institute. There are currently more than 3 million fossils there, mainly vertebrates, invertebrates and plants. They are also the most diverse collections both in terms of systematic groups and in dimensions of the specimens. These range from a size smaller than a cell (nanofossils) to that of a dinosaur or a whale.
- Geology: The rich geological collection of the Royal Belgian Institute of Natural Sciences includes rocks, minerals and meteorites, but also carrots and drilling descriptions.
Type: single-sited infrastructure
Creation date: 1846
Access & costs: Please contact the responsible of the collection you would like to visit (see the list of contact persons below).
Website: collections.naturalsciences.be
Contacts:
- Patrick Semal, Head conservator & anthropology collection curator - patrick.semal@naturalsciences.be
- Wouter Dekoninck, entomology collection curator - wouter.dekoninck@naturalsciences.be
- Yves Samyn, recent invertebrates collection curator - yves.samyn@naturalsciences.be
- Olivier Pauwels, recent vertebrates collection curator - olivier.pauwels@naturalsciences.be
- Annelise Folie, palaeontology collection curator - annelise.folie@naturalsciences.be
- Marleen de Ceukelaire, geology collection curator - marleen.deceukelaire@naturalsciences.be
Photo credits: © RBINS - Yves Barette