NHM Expeditions - Costa Rica

This project, funded by the National Science Foundation, focuses on the study of nudibranch mollusks of Costa Rica. It is a collaborative, international effort to train students to become professional systematic biologists and to increase the public’s understanding and protection of the rich biodiversity of Costa Rica, which is not completely known. Additionally, we hope to help people better understand what nudibranchs are, why they are important, and how systematic research is done. The project also shows the excitement and challenges of doing scientific fieldwork and discovering new species, while showcasing the field expedition of a diverse team of scientists, educators, students and a videographer. We hope that this project will inspire young students from many backgrounds to consider a career in systematic biology as they better understand the work that systematic biologists undertake, why that work is important and the urgent need for such scientists.

The foundation of this project is a research collaboration between the California Academy of Sciences, the Natural History Museum of Los Angeles County, and the Instituto Nacional de Biodiversidad of Costa Rica, studying the evolutionary history and systematics of dorid nudibranchs, shell-less marine snails, and documenting what species inhabit the waters along the Pacific Coast of Costa Rica. This area has only recently been surveyed and many new species have been discovered. The project follows the team during a two-week field trip. It provides a snapshot of a longer-term study that spans more than five years. Only through long-term field studies do we begin to build an understanding of what species occur in a region, how those species are distributed, and how they are related to each other. These are the first steps necessary for developing a comprehensive plan on how to protect that diversity and to monitor how effectively the management plan is working. As global biodiversity faces a major, human-induced crisis of extinction, these kinds of studies are more important and urgent than ever before.

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