Electronically Cataloguing Butterflies

Contact: Matthew Hayes, UMZC <mph51@cam.ac.uk>

The University Museum of Zoology, Cambridge (UMZC) has over two million specimens stored behind the scenes, which were collected over the last 200 years by famous naturalists such as Charles Darwin. Due to their age, it was not possible to electronically catalogue the vast majority of these specimens at the time of their collection. Therefore, many had their details transcribed by hand and their records now exist in physical log books, which are not easily accessible to most audiences. Your task is to use optical character recognition and machine learning to transcribe the notebook of one individual into an electronic database (such as an excel spreadsheet). Working with the UMZC and Peterborough Museum, you will get the chance to go behind the scenes and view collections usually inaccessible to the public and use cutting edge techniques to help solve real world problems of specimen conservation and data preservation in Museums.