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Why do we need MIDS?

The need to rapidly digitise millions of specimens in Natural History Collections has seen a staged approach for data capture being widely adopted. Mass digitisation programmes have generally started with the creation of skeletal or stub records which can then be expanded as more funding or support is available. When combined with the previous practice which was often to create relatively full data records for each specimen, there is currently huge variation in the level of digitisation both within and between collections.

The Minimum Information about a Digital Specimen (MIDS) specification has been designed to provide a means of measuring and monitoring the level of digitisation of specimens within a collection. It provides guidance for prioritising the data to be captured as well as recommendations for data standards and mapping structures.

Getting started

Public Review

First setup of MIDS documentation pages Last Updated: 9 January 2025