Embedded Files
TAP TCN
TAP TCN
The Tropical African Plants (TAP) Thematic Collections Network (TCN) was formed in September 2022 as a collaborative project funded by the National Science Foundation through the Advancing Digitization of Biodiversity Collections (ADBC) program. TAP aims to (1) digitize specimens and associated data of African collections deposited in herbaria in the United States, (2) georeference and improve those data, and (3) share them openly with the global science and conservation communities.
About the Project
About the Project
The Tropical African Plants Project is a large-scale effort designed to establish important new biodiversity data resources. The initiative began with a “proof of concept” project, supported by the JRS Biodiversity Foundation, and led by Prof. Alex Asase (University of Ghana), which resulted in digitization of more than 250,000 biodiversity data records from European and West African herbaria. The present effort, supported by the U.S. National Science Foundation, will lead to the digitization of more than 1.1M herbarium specimens and associated data records from across tropical Africa housed in 21 U.S. herbaria. Links to both of these proposals are provided below.
JRS 2014: West African Plants Project (led by Prof. Alex Asase)
NSF 2022: Tropical African Plants Project
Geographic Focus
Geographic Focus
Specimens from the following countries are being targeted in this digitization project:
Angola, Benin, Burkina Faso, Burundi, Cameroon, Central African Republic, Chad, Congo, Cote D'Ivoire, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Djibouti, Equatorial Guinea, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Gabon, Gambia, Ghana, Guinea, Guinea-Bissau, Kenya, Liberia, Malawi, Mali, Mozambique, Niger, Nigeria, Rwanda, São Tomé and Principe, Senegal, Sierra Leone, Somalia, Sudan, Tanzania, Togo, Uganda, and Zambia. However, specimens from other countries in and near Africa may also be digitized as part of efficient workflows at individual herbaria.
The African Plants Portal is broader in scope than the funded projects, and is open to participation by any institution wishing to use the resource and/or contribute data. The ultimate goal of the portal is to enable an ever-expanding global storehouse of plant biodiversity data regarding Africa, to facilitate a new generation of analyses that will inform and illuminate the understanding and conservation of the continent's rich flora.
How to Participate: African Plants Portal
How to Participate: African Plants Portal
For researchers and students interested in using data from this project, they are openly available and accessible via the African-plants.org portal.
Institutions with herbaria and other biocollections interested in contributing data should contact the Symbiota Support Hub, which has created and is maintaining the system of portals for biodiversity data.
Project Publications
Project Publications
von Konrat, M., Rodriguez, Y., Bailey, C., Gwilliam, G. F., III, Christian, C., Aguero, B., Ahn, J., Albion, Z., Allen, J. R., Bailey, C., Blake, E., Blake, W., Blake, G., Briscoe, L., Budke, J. M., Campbell, T., Chansler, M., Clark, D., Delapena, R., Denslow, M., Dodinval, D., Dux, E., Ellis, S., Ellwood, E., Enkhbayer, M., Ens, B., Evans, N. M., Fabian, A., Ferguson, A., Gaswick, W., Golembiewski, K., Grant, S., Hancock, L., Hansen, K., Janney, B., Jones, J., Kachian, Z., Kawasaki, M. L., Kellum, K., Leek, O., Lichamer, A., Maier, C., Mast, A., Martinec, J. L., Mayer, P., Mladek, M., Nadhifah, A., Neefus, C., Nodulman, M., Oliver, M., Overberg, K., Peterson, A. T., Qazi-Lampert, A., Rothfels, C., Ryan, Z. A., Salm, R., Schreiner, D., Schreiner, M., Tepe, E. J., Turcatel, M., Vega, A., Wade, H., Webbink, K., Weinand, D., Widhelm, T., & Zwingelberg, M. (2024). From spectators to stewards: Transforming public involvement in natural history collections. Natural History Collections and Museomics, 1, 1–33. https://doi.org/10.3897/nhcm.1.138247
Herbst, R., Stille, D., Gwilliam, G. F., III, et al. (2025). Unlocking the past: The potential of large language models to revolutionize transcription of natural history collections. Data Intelligence, 7, Article 2025r09, 237–264. https://doi.org/10.3724/2096-7004.di.2025.0011
Meetings and Presentations
Meetings and Presentations
Meetings and Symposia
Asase, A., Bissiengou, P., & Peterson, A. T. (2025). The Tropical African Plants Initiative: Mobilizing large-scale herbarium data for science and conservation [Symposium]. XXIII AETFAT Congress. Accra, Ghana.
Satellite Meeting at XX INTERNATIONAL BOTANICAL CONGRESS MADRID 2024. Open Meeting-African Plants TCN Digitization, July 26, 2024. The meeting was open to any interested attendees at IBC and was an information session on this project and the utility of the data being generated by it.
Presentations
Appau, Y., & Derkyi, A. A. M. (2025, August). Assessing people's knowledge, attitudes, and practices in a community-driven ecological restoration initiative: Insight from Ghana [Oral presentation]. XXIII AETFAT Congress, Accra, Ghana.
Barberá, P., Asase, A., Borokini, I. T., Colwell, A., Davis, C. C., Franz, N. M., Fritsch, P., Gilbert, E., Isaac, B. L., Johnson, R., Kaplin, B. A., Kartzinel, R. Y., Kawasaki, M. L., Kennedy, J., Kluse, J., Kramer, E. M., Lagomarsino, L., Livshultz, T., Lowry, P. P., McMahon, M., Mishler, B. D., Mzumara, T. I., Nazaire, M., Nixon, K. C., Obiang, N. E., Orli, S., Pearson, K., Peterson, A. T., Potter, D., Power, M. J., Rehman, T. F., Schmidt, H., Simmons, D. R., Schmull, M., Schuettpelz, E., Smith, C. R., Snow, N., Sweeney, P. W., Tarnowsky, N., Teisher, J. K., Weiblen, G. D., Whitfeld, T. J. S., Wieczorek, J., & Zermoglio, P. (2024, July). Digitization and Enrichment of U.S. Herbarium Data from Tropical Africa to Enable Urgent Quantitative Conservation Assessments [Oral presentation]. XX International Botanical Congress (IBC 2024). Madrid, Spain.
Bissiengou, P., Kenfack, D., Nguema Ekomo, D., Engone Obiang, N. L., Memiaghe, H., Feistner, A., & Alonso, A. (2025, August). Taxonomic studies on the tree species in the Rabi Forest Monitoring Plot (Gabon) [Oral presentation]. XXIII AETFAT Congress, Accra, Ghana.
Borokini, I. T., Mishler, B. D., & Laffan, S. (2024, July). Revisiting the patterns of African flora biodiversity using spatial phylogenetics [Oral presentation]. 20th International Botanical Congress, Madrid, Spain. https://ibcmadrid2024.com/?seccion=scientificArea&subSeccion=detailAbstract&id=872.
Borokini, I. T., Mishler, B. D., & Laffan, S. (2025, August). Spatial phylogenetics of native African seed plants [Oral presentation]. XXIII AETFAT Congress, Accra, Ghana.
Haindi, A. J. & Kaunda, N. D. (2025, August). Medicinal plants use and knowledge in Malawi: The case of genus Aloe [Oral presentation]. XXIII AETFAT Congress, Accra, Ghana.
Kayuni, B., & Mzumara, T. I. (2025, August). Improving spatial accuracy for historical African plant records in the herbaria [Oral presentation]. XXIII AETFAT Congress, Accra, Ghana.
Klein, M., Mount, K., Bunch, S., Reyes, B., Simmons, D. R., & Aime, M. C. (2025, March). African rust fungi (Basidiomycota, Pucciniales) in the Purdue University Arthur Fungarium (PUR): An unrecognized resource for the study of Ugandan plant pathology [Poster presentation]. Indiana Academy of Science Annual Meeting. Indianapolis, Indiana.
Klein, M., Mount, K., Bunch, S., Reyes, B., Simmons, D. R., & Aime, M. C. (2025, April). African rust fungi (Basidiomycota, Pucciniales) in the Purdue University Arthur Fungarium (PUR): An unrecognized resource for the study of Ugandan plant pathology [Poster presentation]. Purdue University Spring Undergraduate Research Exposition, Purdue University, West Lafayette, Indiana, United States.
Linan, A. G., Schmidt, H. H., Pearson, K., Asase, A., Borokini, I. T., Colwell, A., Davis, C., Franz, N. M., Fritsch, P. W., Gilbert, E., Isaac, B. L., Johnson, R., Kaplin, B. A., Kartzinel, R. Y., Kawasaki, M. L., Kennedy, J., Kluse, J., Kramer, E. M., Lagomarsino, L., Livshultz, T., McMahon, M., Mishler, B. D., Mzumara, T. I., Nazaire, M., Obiang, N. E., Orli, S., Peterson, A. T., Potter, D., Power, M. J., Rehman, T., Schmull, M., Schuettpelz, E., Simmons, D. R., Smith, C. R., Snow, N., Sweeney, P. W., Tarnowsky, N., Teisher, J. K., Weiblen, G. D., Whitfeld, T. J. S., Wieczorek, J., & Zermoglio, P. (2025, July). Digitization and enrichment of U.S. herbarium data from tropical Africa to enable urgent quantitative conservation assessments [Poster presentation]. Botany 2025 Annual Meeting, Palm Springs, California, United States.
Mboma, R., & Engone Obiang, N. (2025, August). Effort d'investigation sur Guibourtia tessmannii (Harms) J. Léonard (Fabaceae) [Oral presentation]. XXIII AETFAT Congress, Accra, Ghana.
M’manga, G. M., Mwafongo, E., M’bwana, B., Namoto, M., & Mzumara-Gawa, T. I. (2025, August). Assessing the conservation status of Malawi’s endemic flora: Urgent needs and challenges [Oral presentation]. XXIII AETFAT Congress, Accra, Ghana.
Mzumara-Gawa, T. I., Mbeya, D., & Mwafongo, E. (2025, August). The role of geo-referenced herbaria data in the development of national ecosystem types maps [Oral presentation]. XXIII AETFAT Congress, Accra, Ghana.
Nazaire, Mare (2023, May). Enriching the Internship Experience Through Digitization of the RSA Herbarium. [Oral presentation]. Society for the Preservation of Natural History Collections (SPNHC) 2023. San Francisco, California.
Nkhata, A., Chingaipe, A., & Mzumara, T. I. (2025, August). Leveraging iNaturalist for plant species mobilization and identification in Malawi [Oral presentation]. XXIII AETFAT Congress, Accra, Ghana.
Peterson, A. Townsend (2022, September). Digitization and Enrichment of U.S. Herbarium Data from Tropical Africa to Enable Urgent Quantitative Conservation Assessments. [Oral presentation]. 2022 Biodiversity Digitization Conference (BioDigiCon). Virtual.
Peterson, A. Townsend (2024, May). Managing Biodiversity Data in the Blockchain: Full Tracking of All Data Transactions Through Time in Managing Systematic Collections. [Oral presentation]. iDigBio Digital Data 2024: Synthesizing & Harmonizing Data for Integrated Biodiversity Research. Lawrence, Kansas.
Schmidt, H. H., Linan, A. G., Pearson, K., Asase, A., Borokini, I. T., Colwell, A., Davis, C., Franz, N. M., Fritsch, P. W., Gilbert, E., Isaac, B. L., Johnson, R., Kaplin, B. A., Kartzinel, R. Y., Kawasaki, M. L., Kennedy, J., Kluse, J., Kramer, E. M., Lagomarsino, L., Livshultz, T., McMahon, M., Mishler, B. D., Mzumara, T. I., Nazaire, M., Obiang, N. E., Orli, S., Peterson, A. T., Potter, D., Power, M. J., Rehman, T., Schmull, M., Schuettpelz, E., Simmons, D. R., Smith, C. R., Snow, N., Sweeney, P. W., Tarnowsky, N., Teisher, J. K., Weiblen, G. D., Whitfeld, T. J. S., Wieczorek, J., & Zermoglio, P. (2025, July). Digitization and enrichment of U.S. herbarium data from tropical Africa to enable urgent quantitative conservation assessments [Oral presentation]. Botany 2025 Annual Meeting, Palm Springs, California, United States.
Schmidt, H. H., Linan, A. G., Pearson, K., Asase, A., Borokini, I. T., Colwell, A., Davis, C., Franz, N. M., Fritsch, P. W., Gilbert, E., Isaac, B. L., Johnson, R., Kaplin, B. A., Kartzinel, R. Y., Kawasaki, M. L., Kennedy, J., Kluse, J., Kramer, E. M., Lagomarsino, L., Livshultz, T., McMahon, M., Mishler, B. D., Mzumara, T. I., Nazaire, M., Obiang, N. E., Orli, S., Peterson, A. T., Potter, D., Power, M. J., Rehman, T., Schmull, M., Schuettpelz, E., Simmons, D. R., Smith, C. R., Snow, N., Sweeney, P. W., Tarnowsky, N., Teisher, J. K., Weiblen, G. D., Whitfeld, T. J. S., Wieczorek, J., & Zermoglio, P. (2025, July). Digitization and enrichment of U.S. herbarium data from tropical Africa to enable urgent quantitative conservation assessments [Oral presentation]. XXIII AETFAT Congress, Accra, Ghana.
Simmons, D. R., Bunch, S. M., Reyes, B., & Aime, M. C. (2024, March). African Plants in the Purdue University Herbaria Arthur (PUR) and Kriebel (PUL) Collections. [Poster presentation]. Indiana Academy of Science annual meeting. Indianapolis, Indiana.
Simmons, D. R., Bunch, S. M., Reyes, B., & Aime, M. C. (2024, March). Digitization of the African plants of the Arthur Fungarium (PUR) and Kriebel Herbarium (PUL) at Purdue University. [Poster presentation]. 2024 American Society of Plant Biologists, Midwest Section Meeting. West Lafayette, Indiana.
Simmons, D. R., Bunch, S. M., Reyes, B., & Aime, M. C. (2024, June). Digitization of the African rust fungi (Pucciniales) of the Arthur Fungarium (PUR) in the Purdue University Herbaria [Poster presentation]. Mycological Society of America 2024 Annual Meeting, Markham, Ontario, Canada. https://msafungi.org/program-schedule-2024-msa-annual-meeting/.
Sinclair, D. & Mzumara, T. I. (2025, August). The food plants of Mylothris sagala and the endangered Oreocnemis phoenix [Oral presentation]. XXIII AETFAT Congress, Accra, Ghana.
Smith, C. (2025, May). Digitization of specimens from Africa housed in the PH Herbarium (Philadelphia, Pennsylvania) [Poster presentation]. Society for the Preservation of Natural History Collections (SPNHC) Spring 2025 Annual Meeting, University of Kansas, Lawrence, Kansas, United States. https://virtual.oxfordabstracts.com/event/74160/submission/205.
Uwase, A. S. (2025, August). The national herbarium of Rwanda - A five-year redevelopment history (2020-2025) [Oral presentation]. XXIII AETFAT Congress, Accra, Ghana.
Citizen Science and Outreach
Citizen Science and Outreach
The Field Museum (FM) hosted community scientists to participate in digitization projects at the Field Museum Collections Club. Fourteen community scientists attended an event in December 2022, learned about this project and its main objectives, and barcoded ~1800 specimens of flowering plants from Africa; in January 2023, 32 community scientists barcoded a further 5271 specimens. (Photo credit: Matt von Konrat)
In April 2023, FM hosted a WeDigBio Event, wherein community scientists were invited to participate in digitization projects at the Field Museum. FM also hosted a Bank of America Community Volunteering Program, where 18 people attended and barcoded 2976 African plant specimens. Finally, FM Members' Night events provided FM members with the opportunity to visit behind-the-scenes areas to meet scientists and learn about their research projects, including a display about this project in the Imaging Lab.
In April and July 2024, interested members of the public were invited to attend open tours at the University and Jepson Herbaria (UCJEPS) at the University of California, Berkeley. The tours of the herbarium included a demo of the digitizing lab, showing people the process of digitizing and using African specimens as an example.
Other Project Documentation
Other Project Documentation
Adventures in the Herbarium: Preserving African Plants (Episodes 1 & 2), two podcasts prepared by the summer interns from Education Department at the Field Museum, shared on https://rss.com/podcasts/teenstudio/
Desalvio, Serina. (2024, July 8). Missouri Botanical Garden: AI used to learn how trees move. St. Louis Post-Dispatch, Vol. 146, No. 190. https://www.stltoday.com/news/local/metro/mobot-uses-ai-to-learn-how-trees-move-and-to-save-millions-of-plant-specimens/article_fb9f9660-3885-11ef-8f5a-57b61f2acc14.html
In February 2025, New York Botanical Garden’s storytelling platform, The Hand Lens, published a story that uses digitized herbarium specimens to talk about making Antemoro paper in Madagascar (DBI-2223881): Mitra, J. (2025, February 19). Exploring Antemoro paper. The William & Lynda Steere Herbarium, New York Botanical Garden. https://sweetgum.nybg.org/science/the-hand-lens/explore/narratives-details/?irn=7771
Georeferencing Coordination
Georeferencing Coordination
John Wieczorek, Rauthiflor LLC, Bariloche, Argentina
Paula Zermoglio, Instituto de Investigaciones en Recursos Naturales, Agroecología y Desarrollo Rural (IRNAD)
This project is exploring a unique, intercontinental collaborative approach to enriching the basic data records held in the U.S. herbaria that are participating. That is, the project focuses on herbarium specimens that were originally taken from across Africa, and that are now deposited in herbaria in the U.S. The U.S. herbaria are imaging herbarium sheets and transcribing data to their institutional databases, but the crucial step of georeferencing the data records is being done by African students and scientists; this intercontinental collaboration reflects the dual nature of the data resource, both as documentation of permanent specimens in herbaria, and as research materials that will likely be used in largest part by African scientists.
Georeferencing coordination, led by John Wieczorek, Rauthiflor LLC, Bariloche, Argentina and Paula Zermoglio, Instituto de Investigaciones en Recursos Naturales, Agroecología y Desarrollo Rural (IRNAD), began with training the georeferencing teams in Gabon, Ghana, Malawi, and Rwanda from June to August 2023. Recordings of each live class and Q&A session of the African Plants Georeferencing Train the Trainers Workshop are shared on YouTube at https://tinyurl.com/AfricanPlantsGeorefCourseYT .
Georeferencing Teams
Georeferencing Teams
L’Herbier National du Gabon, Libreville, Gabon
L’Herbier National du Gabon, Libreville, Gabon
Nestor Engone Obiang (Georeferencing Team Lead)
Pulchérie Bissiengou
Raymonde Mboma
Centre for Plant Medicine Research (CPMR), Mampon-Akuapem, Ghana
Centre for Plant Medicine Research (CPMR), Mampon-Akuapem, Ghana
Alex Asase (Georeferencing Team Lead)
Michael Akuamoah-Boateng
Giles Antwi-Boasiko
Yaw Appau
Seyiram Kumordzie
Ben Williams
Malawi University of Science and Technology, Limbe, Malawi
Malawi University of Science and Technology, Limbe, Malawi
Tiwonge Mzumara-Gawa (Georeferencing Team Lead)
Sally Chingaipe
Naomi Damalankhunda Kaunda
Amedeus Haindi
Benford Kayuni Jr.
Ben Mbwana
George Malembo M'manga
Aubrey Nkhata
Deborah Sinclair
Dr. Tiwonge Mzumara-Gawa
African Plants Georeferencing Training in Malawi
Location: Salima, Malawi (September 28, 2024)
Focus: Georeferencing localities from Tanzania
During the workshop, the team finished working on localities from Tanzania (of the specimen records for this project). They helped each other with difficult localities, recapped key considerations for georeferencing, and oriented each other on how the project is informing other important activities in Malawi, like the IUCN National Redlisting and Key Biodiversity Areas assessments.
Location: T&D Lodge, Zomba, Malawi (May 2-3, 2024)
Focus: Georeferencing African plants
Description: This training session focused on training additional georeferencers in Malawi to georeferenced African plants, to increase the size of the team from three to eight members to enhance productivity. The participants engaged in hands-on activities and discussions to improve data collection and management techniques.
Dr. Gawa's team has been involved in recent National Redlisting Workshops, separate, but informed by this project. The plant data being georeferenced has been valuable in informing fauna species presence in Malawi, which are undergoing assessment based on IUCN standards.
Center of Excellence in Biodiversity and Natural Resource Management at University of Rwanda, Kigali, Rwanda
Center of Excellence in Biodiversity and Natural Resource Management at University of Rwanda, Kigali, Rwanda
Beth A. Kaplin (Georeferencing Team Lead)
Fabrice Dufatanye
Pacifique Niyodushima
Alexis Nsabimana
Jean de Dieu Nsenganeza
Pascal Sibomana
Edmond Twagirayezu
Aime Sandrine Uwase
Project Management
Project Management
This project is led by Dr. A. Townsend Peterson, University Distinguished Professor at the Biodiversity Institute and Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology at the University of Kansas.
Collaborators
Collaborators
A. Townsend Peterson, lead PI, University of Kansas Center for Research (DBI-2223875)
Brent Mishler, PI, University of California, Berkeley, University Herbarium (UC) and Jepson Herbaria (JEPS) (DBI-2223876)
Mare Nazaire, PI, California Botanic Garden (RSA) (DBI-2223877)
Nico Franz, PI, University of Kansas Center for Research (DBI-2223878)
Alex Linan, PI, Porter Lowry, Co-PI, Patricia Barberá, Former PI, Missouri Botanic Garden (MO) (DBI-2223879)
Elena Kramer, PI, Harvard University Herbaria (GH) (DBI-2223880)
Nicole Tarnowsky, PI, New York Botanical Garden (NY) (DBI-2223881)
Bonnie L. Isaac, Subaward PI, Carnegie Museum of Natural History (CM) (DBI-2223875)
Maria Lucia Kawasaki, Subaward PI, Field Museum of Natural History (F) (DBI-2223875)
Timothy Whitfeld, Subaward PI, University of Minnesota (MIN) (DBI-2223875)
Tatyana Livshultz, Subaward PI, Academy of Natural Sciences of Drexel University (PH) (DBI-2223875)
D. Rabern Simmons, Subaward PI, Purdue University (PUL) (DBI-2223875)
Patrick Sweeney, Subaward PI, Yale University (YU) (DBI-2223875)
Partners
Partners
Michelle McMahon, University of Arizona (ARIZ)
Kevin Nixon, Anna Stalter, and Hannah Marx, L. H. Bailey Hortorium Herbarium at Cornell University (BH)
Peter Fritsch and Tiana F. Rehman, Philecology Herbarium at the Botanical Research Institute of Texas (BRIT)
Rebecca Y. Kartzinel, Brown University (BRU)
Robert Johnson, Brigham Young University (BRY)
Alison Colwell and Daniel Potter, University of California, Davis (DAV)
Neil Snow, Pittsburg State University (KSP)
Laura Lagomarsino and Jennifer Kluse, Louisiana State University (LSU)
Sylvia Orli and Eric Schuettpelz, National Museum of Natural History (US)
Mitchell J. Power, University of Utah (UT)
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