Nannofossil collections
Coccolith
The nannofossil collections housed by the Museum are particularly important for ocean acidification studies. They contain both fossil and modern coccolithophores.
The museum's nannofossil collections are primarily image catalogues of key species, a mixture of
- taxa, collected during cruise studies to evaluate the biology of living coccoliths
- some fossil material
We have a catalogue of tens of thousands of scanning electron microscope images and the stubs from which they were obtained.
We also hold a
- Microfossil reference collection of nannofossils for the Ocean Drilling Programme of approximately 5,000 slides covering the range of sediments recovered by the Deep Sea Drilling Project (DSDP) and Ocean Drilling Project (ODP ). A key resource for coccolithophore research.
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Nanofossils
Learn about the microscopic single-celled algae and their preservation as nannofossils.