Decapod Collection

The ULLZ (University of Louisiana Zoological) decapod crustacean collection consists of approximately 17,000 cataloged and database- referenced lots of marine crabs, shrimps, lobsters, and their relatives. These holdings representing over 70,000 ethanol-preserved specimens, many of which are vouchers for published illustrations and gene-sequence data, in some cases also serving as paratypes for newly described species.

Most of the collection and all sequence quality holdings derive from work over the last four decades by its curator, Dr. Darryl L. Felder, and his graduate students, postdoctoral associates, and collaborators. These materials, widely cited in publications, represent the largest archive of sequence quality marine decapod specimens from the Americas, with selected other world regions also represented.

Major research projects supported by the US Department of Energy, US Geological Survey, Smithsonian Institution, US Food and Drug Administration, the (post-BP Spill) Gulf of Mexico Research Initiative, and US National Science Foundation (especially the NSF Decapod Tree of Life Project) have contributed to its growth and require continued high archival standards. Holdings that represent long term sampling of decapod crustaceans from the Gulf of Mexico have recently proven essential to comparative evaluation of northern Gulf decapod crustacean communities before and after the BP Macondo oil spill.