Molluscan species database on gopher

[Gary Rosenberg]

                         Announcing Malacolog 2.0

Malacolog 2.0 is a database for research on the systematics,
biogeography and diversity of mollusks; it attempts to document
all names that have ever been applied to marine gastropods in the
Western Atlantic, along with their geographic and bathymetric
ranges and current classification.  More than 9000 names are
treated, about 4240 of which are currently regarded as
representing valid species.  Malacolog can be accessed via gopher
at erato.acnatsci.org. under the menu item "Molluscan Species
Database."

Many formerly difficult questions about Western Atlantic
gastropods can now be answered easily: "What names buried in
synonymy do I need to re-evaluate to determine if this species is
undescribed?"  "I found this name on a old label in the
collection; what does it mean?"  "Which species have geographic
ranges suggesting that they might occur at my study site?"

More complex questions can also be addressed with Malacolog,
although not directly on gopher due to the limitations of
searches of indexed text files.

     Do the latitudinal ranges of Western Atlantic gastropods
     decrease with proximity to the equator, as predicted by
     Rapaport's Rule?

     What is the synonymy ratio for Western Atlantic gastropods?

     How similar are the faunas of, for example, Florida,
     Yucatan, Panama, Jamaica, Puerto Rico, Netherlands Antilles
     and Northern Brazil, considering only shell-bearing species
     reported in depths shallower than 50 meters that can reach
     greater than 5 mm in length?

The Malacolog and associated bibliographic and gender databases
are maintained in Paradox 4.0.

Gary Rosenberg                        rosenberg at say.acnatsci.org
Malacology Department                               215-299-1033
Academy of Natural Sciences                         fax 299-1170
1900 Benjamin Franklin Parkway
Philadelphia, PA 19103-1195, USA