Sample Repositories

NEON Biorepository at Arizona State University

The primary NEON Biorepository, curated by Arizona State University, encompasses the long-term storage and curation of most NEON samples and specimens. This includes voucher specimens, whole organisms, tissues, and samples collected and processed for chemistry, disease and genetics. A subset of samples are archived at and available from various curation facilities listed below. Questions about samples not housed at the NEON Biorepository at Arizona State University should be sent directly to those repositories.

U.S. National Tick Collection at Georgia Southern University

Tick sampling is conducted at 46 out of NEON's 47 terrestrial field sites (all but PUUM in Hawaiʻi). Once samples are collected from the field, NEON’s field ecologists process, pack, and ship the samples to contracted experts for enumeration and identification to species, life stage, and sex (when possible). A subset of identified ticks is then sent for pathogen testing using DNA analysis to identify which pathogens each specimen is carrying. Ticks not tested for pathogens are archived in 2mL vials filled with ethyl alcohol, as are any remaining nucleic acid extracts following pathogen testing.

All tick voucher specimens collected by NEON during construction and in operations through field year 2023 are available and curated through the U.S. National Tick Collection at Georgia Southern University. All tick genomic extracts since NEON sampling began and whole tick specimens collected in 2024 and beyond are available from the NEON Biorepository.

University of Michigan Biological Station

The University of Michigan Biological Station - Sample Archive Facility in Ehlers (UMBS-SAFE) houses the distributed initial characterization soil archives. During the initial operations of every terrestrial field site, soils were collected by U.S. Department of Agriculture - Natural Resources Conservation Service (USDA-NRCS) staff to provide data on a suite of important soil parameters within and across NEON sites (available in DP1.10047.001). Soils were collected from multiple Terrestrial Observation System plots across each site that were sampled up to 1 m deep. These samples serve as a reference of soil physical and chemical conditions at the time operations began at each NEON site, complementing other NEON soils efforts including the Megapit collections made during NEON tower construction and the ongoing operational distributed periodic soil collections. These soil archives are located at UMBS-SAFE and are available upon request.

Museum of Southwestern Biology at the University of New Mexico

Small mammal specimens and tissues collected prior to 2018 through the small mammal protocol, totaling approximately 8,000 to 9,000 samples—including hair, whiskers, blood, ear punches, and feces—are housed at University of New Mexico’s Museum of Southwestern Biology.

Florida Museum of Natural History at the University of Florida

Small mammal vouchers collected in Florida prior to 2018 are housed at University of Florida’s Florida Museum of Natural History.

Carnegie Museum of Natural History and the Essig Museum of Entomology at the University of California, Berkeley

Select pinned ground beetle (carabid) specimens are retained for taxonomic reference by the Carnegie Museum of Natural History and University of California, Berkeley’s Essig Museum of Entomology.

Denver Museum of Nature and Science

Ground beetle specimens (pooled carabids and bycatch stored in ethanol) from Colorado, Florida, and Massachusetts, generally from 2013, are curated at the Denver Museum of Nature and Science.

Monte L. Bean Life Science Museum at Brigham Young University

Legacy herptiles collected through 2021 from ground beetle pitfalls in Utah are archived at Brigham Young University’s Monte L. Bean Life Science Museum.

Bernice Pauahi Bishop Museum

A subset of NEON samples and specimens collected at the Puʻu Makaʻala Natural Area Reserve NEON field site (PUUM) in Hawaiʻi are archived at the Bernice Pauahi Bishop Museum. This subset includes most insects, including pooled and pinned beetles, invertebrate bycatch, pinned mosquitoes, and plant vouchers.