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Natural History Museum - Roberto Portela Miguez

January 22, 2020 Bat Conservation Trust Season 1 Episode 7
BatChat
Natural History Museum - Roberto Portela Miguez
Show Notes Transcript

S1E7 This is the second installment of a two-part special recorded at the Natural History Museum, South Kensington, London.

This time Steve Roe talks with Roberto Portela Miguez who is the senior curator in charge of mammals at the Museum.
Roberto tells the tale of how he and colleagues discovered that a bat preserved in a jar of alcohol which had sat on a shelf in the collections for 30 years was actually a new species to science. He also discusses what role the vast Chiroptera collection at the Museum still has for conservation in today's world.

You can read the original Natural History Museum article here: https://www.nhm.ac.uk/discover/news/2015/october/new-bat-species-found-in-museum-collection.html

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Producer: Steve Roe @SteveRoeBatMan
Cover Art: Rachel Hudson http://rachelhudsonillustration.com/info

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Steve Roe:

This is BatChat, the podcast from the Bat Conservation Trust. Hello, and welcome to the second half of our two part special recorded at the Natural History Museum in London. I'm Steve Roe. And this time I sit down with the senior curator of mammals at the museum who hit the headlines back in 2015, when the news broke, that the museum had discovered a new species of bat. And this had been sat on the shelves in the collection for 30 years. There's around 80 million specimens in Natural History Museum and Roberto Portela Miguez. I said that, right? That's correct, is the senior curator in charge of mammals. So Roberto, how did you come to be in charge of the mammal collection here at the museum?

Roberto Portela Miguez:

Well, sort of like complicated story. Because I mean, I've been in the museum 17 years now. But I think just being one gets in this type of role, I think, I have to go as far back as when I was a kid. I was my parents and my family are the you know, the old word farmers and fishermen. So I was constantly surrounded by death of animals around me, which I think predispose me to be able to cope with one of the aspects of these jobs, which is that you're surrounded by dead animals, carcasses and gruesome appearing specimens. So that help to get into the mood of things and get into the job. I think later, when I sort of joined the museum, I actually started working in the galleries as an assistant and volunteering in my days off with a collections and with the scientists that work in these collections. And eventually, over time, I get some experience. And as lowly, I was offered the opportunity to work in a more permanent bases with different contracts in different groups within the swallowing department. back then. And eventually, I just started this role. I became a permanent curator of mammals about 12 years ago. And slowly progressing through my career to now lead the section

Steve Roe:

So I mean 17 years, presumably, you've seen the museum change in the way it works and things like that, what's, what's the biggest change you've seen in that time?

Roberto Portela Miguez:

I think this obviously, aside from the broader changes, which are in the interest of addressing sort of questions relevant to society nowadays, we have changed as a structure we have changed, plenty of stuff has retired from the time when I started, and new ones have come in new methods, new techniques to explore the collections have changed as well. Back when I started, you used to have to chop about a square centimetre of skin to be able to look at some DNA and nowadays, just a simple hair will do the job. So a lot of things have been improved on progress. And things definitely had to change. Because the demands and how we understand the changes in nature, are different from back then. So we now I think, possibly engaged in more multidisciplinary projects that cover multiple groups at the same time we involve are more involved internationally as well, in collaborations with other countries, other organisations abroad as well. And also the makeup of the staff is also very diverse as well. So it's a fantastic place to work nowadays, I

Steve Roe:

think. Yeah. And what is your day to day job entail?

Unknown:

That's a complex question. Because as senior curator of this section, I have mammals, you will have thought that I just sit quietly on my desk and just look at the scalps and the skins all day, and then every so often publish a paper. But it couldn't be any further from the truth, I think you have to have flexibility and adaptability to work with this collection, because the demands on it are quite high from all angles, really. So I'm involved. Not just in the sort of science exploration of the collection, but also on the public displays that are produced, I deliver talks and for public events, do a lot of outreach, provide content for webs can provide content for books, and a host hundreds of visitors every year to the collections as well as because of that having a lot of collaborations with different groups of researchers all over the place as well. So it's quite a diverse role. So my day starts generally setting up a lot of visitors, then trying to figure out what I'm going to do, how I'm going to tackle some of the more urgent inquiries to do with the section and then just try to go through that. Some days. I'm fortunate that I can dedicate some time to one of the projects that I identify as critical or important for me of interest. But most of the day, I'm just trying to facilitate things so the collections can be maximised

Steve Roe:

and having most of the discarded animal species here in the collection, how many pets specimens, do you have any collection and how many species are there in it?

Unknown:

So the honest answer would be that I don't know, I don't know, because it's one of the largest collections in the world. And we only have part of the database. So it's quite difficult to figure out how much is actually there. But it would be on the 10s of 1000s, if not hundreds of 1000s just for the bats. This, what I can tell you, that I do know is how many species we have. Because a few years back, we did a sort of inventory of all the species that we have represented across the mammal collections. And so we use at the time of publication, which was called Wilson and reader, monsters, pieces of the wall. And at that time, it was published in 2005. Other time, they estimated that there were about 5400 species of mammal. Nowadays, we know this more than that is probably under 6500. But anyway, in that particular period, the number of batters pieces in that volume was about 1000, and 100. And we found in the collections over 100 of those. So it's one of the most comprehensive collections. If you are interested in studying the diversity of bats, or any aspect of by bat, morphology, conservation and ecology, evolutionary history, this is definitely the place to come.

Steve Roe:

And what sort of scientists use the Chiroptera collection?

Unknown:

It's um, traditionally, and for the most are people that are interested in studying the diversity of paths trying to identify or describe a species, see what representatives are out there. But more recently, there's more conservation oriented, even if they are not actively engaged in conservation, a lot of people quest in the collections to see what records of a species existed out there before and then compare it to what we now know that exists out there and see if it's has decay, or in or if there are other species that were missed in previous assessments, and so on. So, but that's not necessarily limited to that. So the majority is obviously, usually a scientific inquiry that uses the collections. But we have also in the past had artists using the collections. We had the signers using the collections, I had people looking at backfit to look at a potential design for the weapon that goes on. Dice put up by builders when they're roofing a house. Breathable roofing land, right. Yeah, exactly. So the bats don't get trouble can't disentangle themselves from that. So that type of thing just happens like that. And a couple of weeks ago, I had somebody that was looking at costume design for the PlayStation game. And so they were interested in just some gruesome specimens that they could use for the design of a costume of a character in a PlayStation game. So

Steve Roe:

And just before we started recording this, you've just been showing me some small part of the collection. And but for the listeners at home, which is your favourite specimen in the collection.

Roberto Portela Miguez:

So leaving aside the one that I described, because obviously that's close to my heart, I think the multiple species will be kitties, hognose bat, which is also scientifically known as customer nectar is double lenses, which is one of the smallest mammals and vertebrates. It's about barely. Two sent it over just over two sent over two centimetres, yes, long. And it's just fascinating that a mammal could be so small, I think that you could have the same sort of body structure, as this polar bear will have more or less and still be a mammal and fly as well, which is just, it's just one of the things that is common to birds, that also blows my mind that a mammal that flies is how can you not fall for these guys, if you have any interest in mammals, this surely have to proceed. But apart from any other things.

Steve Roe:

And what sort of challenges are there with maintaining a collection such as this?

Roberto Portela Miguez:

There are many challenges because it's a large scope in terms of collection, over half a million of specimens of mammals. And obviously, this few of us to keep an eye on everything and to look after everything. And it can be quite demanding in terms of maintenance. Some of the collections that we showed earlier, where the fluid was the collections, which are the specimen is preserved in alcohol, alcohol evaporates. So you need to constantly be vigilant about it and keep an eye on the job so the specimens don't dry out. And then just the access demands for it. There's a lot of visitors coming from all over the world, in the hundreds and so managing that side of things to make it in a safe and secure way so the collections do not running any risk is quite challenging.

Steve Roe:

And what relevance does it still have what what new discoveries are made from the collection? I think

Roberto Portela Miguez:

nowadays has probably become moral haven't done any previous time before, I think like now that we know the impact of human activities in the in the world out there. And we're trying to assess what that impact is and come to terms with it. And so we can put things in place that can help to preserve the nature that we still remains, the collections had got a new lease of life because of that, because people can come and dip into them. And see the historical changes, this collection was started about 300 years ago. And it represents the 100 years of actively collecting specimens from all over the world, from every possible place that you can imagine, even the remotest islands, we got the specimens from and, and therefore, it's a good historical record. And so people now are revisiting those in order to assess what has been the impact of human change in the world. And, but also from other aspects. Now, the molecular work is not just restricted to looking at is how different this species is from another, but also potentially as plus exploring the genetic mechanisms that help for instance, a species like bats carry so many diseases, and yet to not feel humbled by that or look at, for instance, why do they live so long salmon species of bats as well. So exploring those sciatic mechanisms can now also be possible with elements of this collection with parts of this collection. So it's a new lease of life. Also, we now got other equipment like CT scanning, which allows you to, for instance, get a fluid preserve bat and scan it completely without damaging anything of it. And then you're able to look at all the skeletal structure. And that can help you to identify things, like not only tell what species it might be, but also figured out elements about its locomotion and compare it with other species and so on. So is, is now really the time for collections, I think. And I think it's also a good time in terms of international collaboration. So we are very open from people from all over the world to use the collection. And, and this has included a lot of dialogue between scientists, not just from the same discipline, but from other disciplines to cross fertilise ideas, and look at the different topics from different areas. So for instance, one of the projects that I had a few years back, it was looking at limos. And it wasn't just because they're cute, but it was out of genuine interest in terms of reviewing the literature of limos. I thought there was something missing about how do we know exactly what this animal said? So working with I contacted a botanist, since I work at the museum. I got colleagues in other departments. And I thought I maximise on that contacted a botanist, and I said, What do you think about this, and we develop a method in terms of like looking at the diet of lemurs, collecting their faeces, looking at the seeds, but also sampling the plants that they might fit on in areas where they live, and depositing those, which is the key thing of this poll, this project was depositing those samples in museum collection. So people can actually then after was verify where we said that eight, which was not ever done before. So people will go into the field, look at the animals and document that observations. But as we now know, thanks to the molecular evolution is quite difficult to tell a species apart just by so it's necessary to collect samples from the wild so you can actually then deposit them in museums and let future generations also verify what you claims.

Steve Roe:

And you mentioned just then, cross collaboration. And back in 2015, you helped discover a new bat species, which had been sat on a shelf in the collection, just a few rooms away from where we are now. And that had been sat on the shelf here for 30 years. That was collected in July 1983. Can you tell us a bit more about that story and how the discovery came about?

Roberto Portela Miguez:

Sure. So I usually when I had the time, and because I know what researchers that are visiting us want to see in advance, because they declare to me their methods and what the question is, so I can see what is appropriate use of the collection or not. I usually then go ahead and prepare in advance the part of the collection and that is of their interest, so it's more accessible and they can maximise the time of the visit. So I knew that there was a colleague of mine, from Thailand, people at Facebook, who was coming to visit and he was particularly interested in dental office in general from Southeast Asia. And so I decided to go ahead and then start doing some databasing work with that part of the collection. Most of the collection has been database, but there's still big chunks that haven't been done and that's the case with original fluid Research Collection. So as started doing that. And then people came along. And then we had a look at one of these pieces that was there. And then he noticed that the first coloration on that particular specimen was quite different from the rest. And he said, Oh, maybe this is a new species, because it looks quite different. And we had this discussion about well, it could be a mechanistic form, it could be a genetic abnormality, you know, there's no jump to conclusions here. So what do we need to do in order to verify this? And so he immediately following his traditional methods said, oh, we need to take the skull out of the specimen. And is that what if it's going to be the new species, and we only got one specimen, maybe we shouldn't go ahead with a knife. So let me use the CT scanner, and I'll strike the skull digitally. And then we can take some measurements and compare things. And that's what we did. So I went to scan the specimen, collected some measurements, then we put it uncompetitive with a huge table of data that we had for all the groups. And when we did an analysis of that, it showed that it was quite different. But obviously, nowadays, when you're trying to describe a new species, you also need to integrate the molecules into this. And at that time, not much work had been done with fluid Purcell collections. And so for the DNA purposes, and most people gave up on that, because most specimens that are preserved in fluid, I usually go through first a bath in formalin, which stops at the composition of the specimen, but also scrambles up the DNA. And so we didn't think that it was possible to sample this one. In any case, we will also curious about the fact whether this species still occurs in the wild. And people being from Thailand, he has a lot of contact with conservation organisations all over Southeast Asia. So he contacts some colleagues that were doing some surveys in Sabah, the place where this specimen was collected, and said, Well, would you mind having a look and see if it's still there? And actually, they went there found a colony? And then they said, Yeah, apparently still here, were able to take a few blood samples, collected a couple of specimens, and they collect a few more tissue samples. And then we had both, not just the metrics, but also the molecular side of things to compare and establish that it's actually a valid new species.

Steve Roe:

Make it sound so easy. Yeah, it's

Roberto Portela Miguez:

a it's, it's actually surprising that I can say this such few minutes, because it actually I think, took probably two three years, do we actually publish anything?

Unknown:

And you've named it after the person who collects it originally France, the Francis' Woolley Horseshoe bat,

Roberto Portela Miguez:

yes. So it was collected by Charles Francis, who is somebody that has worked extensively throughout Asia, published extensively there. So it's helped tremendously for people to figure out what actually, you can find in terms of mammalian fauna, in that neck of the woods. And so I think it's well deserved. He's not just for having collected, but because of recent, extensive work.

Steve Roe:

I mean, you've just pretty much answered the next question, but what role does the museum play in current about conservation? And how will the institution helping the future?

Roberto Portela Miguez:

This is it. So there are species in here that can, I mean, one of the things that we get from conservation stuff is usually before they set off in their exploratory tours of a particular area, they usually first come to the collections here, and have a guess about what species might occur there and get familiar with how they've looked like. And they build up this sort of like personal identification guides. Because when you sort of try to find Field Guide for certain parts of the world, they just don't exist. The experts haven't been around there, nobody has done any collecting, there's no museum specimens for that, maybe. So they usually come here, they have sort of a rough idea of what species have been reported for a country. And then they check those, but they also see if there's any others from other from that country that might have been missed from the field guides, and then they produce their kids. So without that, I think a lot of the conservation efforts will be blind to begin with, you know, without a baseline of what might occur there and how it might look like. But then also, when they go in those fields, and they do the biodiversity assessments, they rapid surveys, and they collect some specimens that they may find that they cannot identify or tell from immediately. Usually, that happens quite a lot with small mammals, because you know, they just you just see them flying away, or skidding away around the corners and disappearing too. And all the rats do the same, all the bats look the same. So unless you take the specimen and look at it carefully, then you won't be able to tell what it is. So then when they collect those specimens, they need to compare them with a collection that is as comprehensive as ours so they can discard different species that they might be and actually find out whether it's a new species or is one of the other side We already know about. So the collections in that respect, offer all that for conservation to begin with. And then we already obviously talk about baseline data for what species may have occurred in the past there, and so on. So they have incredible relevance for anything to do. I think, in my personal view, with anything to do with biological sciences, you know, if you're trying to determine what diseases are transmitted from, that it might affect humans, you need to identify what species cannot meet those. And so you know, whether it's bad whether it's rodents, for those purposes, the collections can be fantastic in order to do that, because you can explore the DNA in the collections to answer some of those questions. So there are multiple uses for the collections.

Steve Roe:

sounds the most amazing job to have in the world.

Roberto Portela Miguez:

It is it is I consider myself very lucky and very privileged to be here, it's opened my eyes to lots of opportunities. It allows me to engage with collaborations from all over the world. And the museum is a fantastic platform, because it also sits in a very privileged position where, you know, whatever we produce, reverberates through the media waves. So when, for instance, we released or produced the press release for the bat. And this was, incidentally, Halloween. And, therefore, it was published in The Guardian, National Geographic, new scientists all over the media. And, and that is phenomenal. This is because you work in this museum. And it allows you the teams that we have here for media relations and press are really good people that I have a lot of contacts and allows for you to disseminate the science that you do the bulk of the collections, not just within the UK, but across the world. And that is a fantastic opportunity. Because I think the times that we live, you need to engage people with the research that is done about the natural world. So

Steve Roe:

And finally, something we're asking all our guests on the podcast, which three words would you use to describe the bat conservation movement?

Roberto Portela Miguez:

I think the bat conservation movement in the UK, I wouldn't put it into words, a couple of things, it works, I only have to say, praise for people that are engaged in conservation, I think. Because I know that most of these are volunteers efforts. And I find it amazing that people after come in, have the daily job, stay at home and having to deal with the family and all that they still find the time to go out at night with a bad detector. And then not only just for their own pleasure, listen to the noises that bats do. But then report those findings. And I saw I'm you know about the people that do that. Because it's a very important effort is the only way that we know whether a species are present here in the UK, you cannot collect bats in the UK as they're protected by the wild countryside act. So unless we had this volunteers, we will be blind to the biodiversity of the UK, which is terribly important in ecosystem management. So I think I'm just you know, about all the conservation efforts done on bats in the UK, I think is is amazing, something that should be encouraged, and I hope people continue to do so. So

Steve Roe:

great stuff, Roberto, thank you very much. Thank you for having me. That was Roberto Portela Miguez, Senior Curator of mammals at the Natural History Museum. If you enjoyed our two part special, we'd love to hear your thoughts on social media or by leaving a review of this podcast. Join the conversation using the hashtag pet chat. Next time we're spending the day with James Shipman in the counties of Berkshire and Wiltshire