Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory’s (CSHL’s) Library & Archives offer a wealth of invaluable resources documenting the history of biology and medical research. For international Love Data Week, which ran from February 9-13, the CSHL Center for Humanities and History of Modern Biology invited members of the public and the Lab community to view artifacts, books, and other ephemera from its extensive collections spanning more than 200 years of data-driven scientific discovery.
“We included rare books, Nobel Prize-winning research, key materials from our personal and institutional collections, and more that together chronicle the development of molecular biology,” says Ludmila Pollock, the Center for Humanities’ Robert D.L. Gardiner Chair. “It’s an absolutely unique catalog of key discoveries and personal contributions to the development of molecular biology.”
The CSHL Archives house over 5,000 linear feet of written materials open to scientists, historians, and the public. Contained within are the personal collections of nearly three dozen notable scientists, a large repository of oral history interviews, and records of nearly 100 international symposia on the life sciences. These records offer an important glimpse into the foundations of modern biology and medicine.
“You cannot live without the memory of the past,” Pollock explains. “We preserve not only experiments and developments in science. We preserve the interactions between people, the different approaches to science, the collaborations, the correspondence. It’s all here at CSHL, it’s original, and it’s an absolutely invaluable resource.”
Written by: Nick Wurm, Communications Specialist | [email protected] | 516-367-5940