Building a
collection of Palestine's biodiversity is a core aim of the museum, and field-based research has assembled the collection. One project collected ten species of freshwater snails from Palestine, which were accession into the museum collection. The freshwater mollusca collection expanded and now includes the first record of
Planorbella duryi, an invasive species in Palestine, from the museum's own pond. Another research programme recorded the biodiversity and unique species at the protected site of
Wadi Qana, the only known site of
Pelobates syriacus in the West Bank. The entomological collection includes
Cetoniinae species from the occupied West Bank, as well as building a collection of 340 grasshopper and locust species, a teratological example of
Nezara viridula from the museum garden, and the first Palestinian record of the invasive species
Cacyreus marshalli. Another find from the museum garden is the first record of a "bat ensnared by a plant in the Arab world". The collection also includes geology, with a discrete assemblage of molluscan and echinoderm fossils collected at
Beit Ummar. The botany collection includes examples of
Orchidaceae, and
macrofungi in the museum's herbarium collection. One vertebrate species collected is an unusual specimen of
Heremites vittata. Museum biologist, Mohammed Abusarhan, As of 2019, the museum was home to over 260 plant specimens, and had just opened an exhibition, funded by the
British Council, on collecting Palestinian agricultural heritage through objects and oral histories. The museum itself has also been the subject of research examining the role of botanic gardens as sites of nation-building and resistance. == Notes ==