The University of Texas Herbaria Type Register
The LL, TEX type register is made available as a result of funding by the National Science Foundation to computerize and disseminate information on the University of Texas Herbaria type specimens.
This database contains all verified type material housed at the Plant Resources Center of The University of Texas at Austin. This catalog has information on over 5400 type specimens including over 1800 holotypes. Not surprisingly, the type register reflects the history and strengths of the Plant Resources Center which houses the LL and TEX herbaria. The Plant Resources Center is a major center of systematic botany for the northern Latin America and the southwestern United States. It is especially strong in Mexican material as reflected by the over 2270 taxa with types from Mexico (42 % of LL, TEX's type holdings). LL,TEX also has 414 type collections from Guatemala and 187 from Belize. Of the 864 taxa from the United States represented in the LL, TEX type collection, 354 are from Texas.
Important type collections housed in the PRC include those of D. S. Correll, C. G. Pringle, S. F. Blake, H. J. Muller, H. Le Sueur, and I. M. Johnston, as well as those of Lundell, Matuda, Contreras, and Gentle from Mexico and northern Central America. Many duplicates and isotypes of the George and James Hinton and Runyon collections are also deposited at TEX-LL as well as type material for many of the taxa in Correll's books on aquatic plants and the tuberous Solanum . In addition, the PRC has significant numbers of Ekman types from the West Indies and H. H. Smith types from Colombia. As a result of the more than 72 Ph.D. dissertations in plant systematics that have been awarded in the last 25 years, types of many genera are dispersed across a wide array of families at TEX.
The largest family represented in the type collection is the Asteraceae with types of over 1171 taxa recognized and verified to date. The next largest families are the Verbenaceae with 417 types and the Eriocaulaceae (415), families studied by Dr. Harold Moldenke. The Myrsinaceae (with types of 357 taxa), the Myrtaceae (129 types), the Celastraceae (115), and the Lauraceae (95), families studied by Dr. Cyrus L. Lundell are also strongly represented. A total of 1057 taxa described by Dr. Lundell are represented in the type collection.
The LL, TEX type database includes holotypes, isotypes, cotypes, syntypes, lectotypes, isolectotypes, neotypes and isoneotypes, but not paratypes or topotypes. All have been verified by either checking the original publication or excepting the annotation of an expert in that group of plants. Author abbreviations follow Authors of Plant Names (Brummitt, R.K. and C. E. Powell,eds., 1992, Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew). Publication citations follow Botanico-Periodicum-Huntianum (Lawrence,G. H. M., A. F. G. Buchheim, G. S. Daniels and H. Dolezal,eds., 1968, Hunt Botanical Library, Pittsburgh) and Botanico-Periodicum-Huntianum /Supplementum (Bridson, G. D. R. and E.R. Smith, 1991, Hunt Institute for Botanical Documentation, Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh) for journals and Taxonomic Literature (Stafleu, F. A. and R. S. Cowan, 7 Vols., 1976 -1988, Bohn, Scheltema & Holema, Utrecht/Antwerpen; dr. W. Junk b.v., Publishers, The Hague/Boston) for books. Whenever possible, country names were updated to their current name. However, in the few cases where it was not possible to determine this accurately based on the paucity of information given on the label, the country was given as stated on the label. State is reported as given on the label.
The most problematic field is the current name designation. Nomenclatural changes sometimes are not noted on the pertinent specimens and taxonomic views often vary widely among specialists. Thus, I generally accepted the most recent annotation label on the specimen itself as the current name. The utility of the database is not to determine current nomenclature, but rather to locate type material that will facilitate systematic study. A blank current name field means that the basionym is a currently accepted name as far as I'm aware.
We ask that users advise us of any errors in the information in this database. Corrections and comments on the database are welcomed. Other comments regarding the on-line service are also solicited.
I thank Ladd Hanson of the General Libraries at the University of Texas at Austin for assistance in transforming the data into WWW format. This material is based on work supported by the National Science Foundation under Grants Nos. BSR-8716949, BSR/DEB-9020277, and DEB 9407764.
Carol A. Todzia, Associate Curator
Plant Resources Center
The University of Texas at Austin
Austin, Texas 78713
(512) 471-9437
ctodzia@mail.utexas.edu
last updated 21 February 1997
Copyright © 1997
Plant Resources Center
The University of Texas at Austin
All rights reserved.
The data in the LL, TEX Type Register Database are being presented for non-commercial, personal use only. Copying or redistributing these data in any manner for financial gain is not permitted.