About this site

Together with GENOSCOPE (National Sequencing Centre), the Centre Interdisciplinaire de Conservation et de Restauration du Patrimoine (CICRP, Interdisciplinary Centre for Heritage Conservation and Restoration) and the Institut National de la Recherche Agronomique (INRA, National Institute for Agronomical Research) set up the Insects of our Cultural Heritage database.

This database lists the insects that can be found in national and local heritage places and represent a risk for the conservation of cultural heritage: museum collections, library and archive reserves, furniture in historical buildings, …

It is a tool that makes it easier to recognise and identify insects found in heritage sites in order to rapidly define and undertake necessary measures against infestation if needs be.

This database is meant for all professionals in charge of heritage conservation, and also for all other professionals and scientists concerned by or interested in these questions.
Lastly, thanks to its ergonomics and its presentation, it is accessible to a wide range of audience.

Altogether 115 species will be accessible on line.

“Insects of our Cultural Heritage”: instructions for use Altogether 115 species will be accessible on line.

Visual identification and direct search for information about insects and related damage are easily accessible from three menus: “Insects from A to Z”, “Infested Materials” and “Identification”.

In the “Insects A - Z” menu, 4 sub-menus allow access to the list of all the insects due to be found in the database, and to the list of the currently available species. Species are accessible from their common French name and from their scientific name.

You will also find general information about animal classification, the notion of species, and also general texts about orders, families, genera and species.

The « Infested Materials » menu groups insects according to the type of material they infest (examples : cellulose (wood, paper…) or collagen (leather, skin…)) depending on their feeding habits (xylophagous (wood-eaters), necrophagous (corpse-eaters)…).

In the « Identification » menu, you will find : 

• Visual identification keys of the orders, families, genera and species of the insects listed in the database.
• A web search engine that allows an insect’s molecular identification from a DNA sequence.

The “Glossary” lists the technical and entomological words used in the database.
Thus it allows a better understanding of the descriptions and makes it easier to access information, whatever the visitor’s technical or scientific knowledge background.

The « Updates » menu gives access to the latest data added to the database

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