Metal cabinets reaching nearly to the ceilings line the hallways of Coker Hall. On the outside, they are ordinary storage cabinets. But on the inside, they hold the southeast's largest herbarium with over 660,000 specimens dating back to the early 1800s.

An herbarium is a collection of plant specimens. If cared for properly, a specimen can literally last forever, allowing researchers a glimpse into the environment of a particular place at a particular time. "But a museum collection doesn't do the public any good if it's locked in cabinets and hard to get to," said Peter White, professor of Biology and Director of the North Carolina Botanical Garden. "What we want to do is make the herbarium more accessible to the public."

In July 2000, the herbarium officially became part of the North Carolina Botanical Gardens (NCBG). Plans are in the works for a new building to house the collection, but NCBG is still awaiting legislative appropriation. So, in the meantime, White and colleagues Evelyn Daniel and Jane Greenberg, both professors of information and library science, are creating an electronic version.

With a couple of grants, including one from the late Chancellor Michael Hooker's technology fund, the herbarium purchased a video camera for creating specimen images and produced a virtual library of North Carolina trees including gymnosperms (pines and their relatives) and angiosperms (flowering plants) in the southeast.

Each specimen includes information such as the plant's scientific name, the name of the person who collected it and where it was found. Researchers can then use the specimens to show, for instance, how a plant species has changed over time. Other uses include environmental planning, identifying plants for poison-control centers, verifying new weeds and confirming illegal plants for law enforcement. Wildflower lovers and horticulturalists can also use the specimens to identify trees they see on their property and in parks and other natural areas.

Another grant in conjunction with the School of Information and Library Science enables the herbarium to work with McDougle Middle School and the Orange County Public Library on a tree identification project. Students use the virtual library of North Carolina tree specimens to identify their own specimens they have collected from the woods, from a park, or from their backyards.

"There's no perfect book for the Southeast for identifying trees," White said. "And the books that are out there typically do not have real specimens, so it's hard to make a judgment based on a picture or a line drawing. The web site helps solve that problem."

While the online version benefits the students, the students are also helping the herbarium by pilot testing their web site. "If kids can get through the web site, then it's going to be user friendly for the general public," said Priscilla Dennison, a science teacher at McDougle Middle School working with the tree identification project.

Additionally, when students are exposed to "real science," they see what it would actually be like to be botanists. They are able to look at professionally annotated specimens, and they learn how to collect a plant, observe a plant, identify a plant, and make specimen mountings of their own.

"I know some of my students will go back to the web site. A few of them may even decide to continue their study of botany using the tools of identification they now have at hand," Dennison said. "The feedback from the kids was excellent, and I know the project helped expand their botanical knowledge base."

Eventually the herbarium will add other groups of plant specimens to their virtual collection. Right now, there are around 1,000 specimens online. "We're trying to post the specimens in blocks that are useful all by themselves, like pines or fungi, so that people don't have to wait until all of the specimens are up before they can use the site." White said.

"Ultimately, our goal is to blur the line between university knowledge and public knowledge, so that people can have ready access to a huge storehouse of information that is not usually used by the vast majority of people."