About the collections of MHNC-UP

MHNC-UP holds important scientific collections. Currently approximately 850.000 specimens, divided through 17 collections, form these collections.  

These collections span through a long timeframe, starting in the mid nineteenth century to the present day, and present diverse geographical origins, being particularly rich in material from the Iberian Peninsula, South America and some of the Portuguese speaking African countries.

A small fraction of these collections is already digitized and has its metadata available through GBIF.org.

The MHNC-UP collections are accessible to everyone (students, researchers, amateurs, etc.) after a formal and timely access request to the Collections and Research Department and to the respective curators.  

As part of its mission, MHNC-UP has recently been receiving and serving as deposit of specimens and scientific collections of ongoing research (either by MHNC-UP researchers and by external researchers), institutional collections and private donations.

For any query related to the access and use of the collections (research accesses, loans, visits, etc.), offers, donation or deposits of specimens/collections, please contact us through this email address: colecoes@mhnc.up.pt.