So two aspects need addressing regarding accessibility in the future:
1) How to obtain the most scientifically significant materials for future researchers, and 2) how to make the museum’s collection more intellectually accessible to its public community.
Part One: The Researchers’ Needs
Standards. Right now, scientists use trusted standards to compare data collection and analysis techniques, as well as to calibrate their instruments. Having calibrated instruments using agreed-upon standards also gives confidence that the data obtained from their experiments will all be valid and comparable. The National Institute of Standards and Technology is an excellent place to go, but few people can afford to buy these standards. There are other places to go for materials, the Clay Mineral Society has a good set of clay standards, the United States Geological Survey has their own set of standards (e.g., rocks), and even university laboratories sell their internal standards to outside users. There are also some generally agreed upon standards that are not housed at any one institution, such as the
forsterite from San Carlos Indian Reservation. In general, standards are expensive to buy, and they are in limited supply. In practice, there are not enough standards for every situation, and sometimes you just need the same material another researcher used in their past work so you can compare numbers.
If the role of the museum is to be a repository of materials that contain a detailed analytical history, and as researchers continue to contribute data on these materials, then the museum collection effectively becomes a free to use standard, becoming more valuable to researchers in the process. But it only works well if people share.
Get Access Now. The museum also houses otherwise inaccessible material. For example, maybe a researcher wants to compare minerals that are included in diamonds from South Africa to those from Brazil. It may be possible for that researcher to: 1) Visit these remote places, somehow gain access to the mines, broker a deal to take the diamonds (at a price), get through customs, and hope that the minerals obtained possess interesting inclusions. Or, 2) go to a museum, search the curated diamond collection for South Africa and Brazil specimens, select the mines of interest, get preliminary data on all potential minerals to ensure usability, and borrow specimens for further investigation. The second option is far simpler and more efficient, and obviously, this scenario can be applied to other mineral research projects. I also realize that not everyone can afford to go to a museum, and
we are trying different things to solve this problem. Of course there is value in the first option, but it is less accessible option to most people.