The Natural History Museum's collection of 5.5 million insects is the largest in southern California, and has specimens from all over the earth. Museum scientists conduct world-class research on systematics, studying species and their relationships, the evolution of major groups, fossil insects in amber, and conduct field work on insect biodiversity at home and in tropical countries.

What's New?

The newly updated information and the news of  events, donations and visitors are included in this page.

Department Staff

Entomology's phone and fax numbers and the staff email addresses are on our departmental staff page.

Collection Resources

The museum's collection has internationally significant holdings in a number of groups, including Lepidoptera (butterflies & moths), Coleoptera (beetles), Diptera (flies) and Hymenoptera (ants, bees and wasps). Most of the collection is housed in over 11,000 insect drawers in a compacterized storage system on the third floor of the museum. There are also many specimens stored in alcohol and on microscope slides.

Research

Current and on-going research projects include:

• Systematic and ecological studies of phorid flies (Diptera: Phoridae)

• 2002 Spider Survey

• Colombia Arthropod Project 

Fieldwork by department staff has been conducted in North, Central and South America, Southeast Asia, southern and eastern Africa and Australia, in a variety of habitats and ecosystems including tropical rainforests and diverse arid environments.

Volunteers 

The contribution of volunteers is invaluable to achieving our goals. If you have an interest in insects and some time to donated, please join us.

Links

Many useful links related to entomology are included in this page.

Contact Us

The museum's address and directions about how to get here are on the contact us page. If you would like to help in the development of the insect collection, get involved in research, or otherwise participate in or support our entomological programs, please contact us.