Hunt Institute for Botanical Documentation
A Research Division of Carnegie Mellon University

Hunt Institute Archives Text Discovery Platform

Search a large and growing portion of our online collections, including handwritten documents.
PROTOTYPE

This prototype uses state-of-the-art artificial intelligence, including a vision-language model (VLM) capable of reading handwritten documents as well as typed and printed text, to create searchable transcriptions of digitized materials in the Hunt Institute Archives. This makes it possible to search the textual contents of individual pages, including material that may not be described in the archival catalog.

Use Keyword search for specific words, names, dates, scientific names, or phrases. Try Semantic search (experimental) to describe a topic, question, or kind of material when you do not know the exact wording used in the documents.

About the AI-generated transcriptions

The transcriptions are generated automatically from page images and may contain errors, especially with difficult handwriting, unusual names, multiple languages, image-quality problems, or complex layouts. They are intended primarily as a discovery aid rather than authoritative transcriptions.

Each result provides the generated transcription and links to the original digitized material and associated archival description so that readings can be checked against the source. The transcription workflow uses AI models run locally by the Hunt Institute.

About Keyword and Semantic search

Keyword search is the default and matches the wording in the transcriptions. Results contain all your terms. Use quotes for an exact phrase. Substring matching is supported, so aceae can find plant-family names ending in -aceae.

Semantic search (experimental) is useful when you know what kind of material you are looking for but do not know the words used in the documents. It ranks transcribed passages by similarity of meaning, so relevant results may not contain the exact words in your query.

Semantic queries can be broad research topics, descriptions of activities or relationships, or natural-language questions. For example:

plant collecting and fieldwork in South America medicinal, culinary, or other traditional uses of plants chromosomes and plant classification early herbals and botanical illustrations botanical institutions exchanging plants, seeds, and specimens microscopy and photomicrography in botanical research How did botanists and gardeners introduce plants from one region to another? grafting, budding, and propagation of tropical fruit crops

Semantic search is not a chatbot: a question is used as a search query, and the system returns archival passages that appear conceptually related to it rather than generating an answer or summary. Short descriptions and ordinary research questions generally work better than lists of disconnected keywords. Quotation marks have no special meaning in Semantic mode. Cross-language matching may work in some cases, but it should not be treated as translation.

Keyword and Semantic search are complementary. Keyword search lets you require particular wording; Semantic search can surface differently worded passages about the same subject. Depending on the research question, trying both can reveal different useful material.

Open a result: use the prominent page-and-transcription link to see the metadata, PDF, and full transcription. Keyword-search terms are highlighted in the transcription.

Archives Collections Database (ArchivesSpace): the Collection, Item/Folder, and Digital Object links open the corresponding archival records. Collection-level dates describe the collection as a whole, not necessarily the specific item or page.

If a PDF does not load: on the detail page, use the Digital Object link, click “Go to file” in ArchivesSpace, and navigate to the page number shown here.

Current limitations
  • Automated transcriptions can contain missing or incorrect text or unintended repetition. Difficult handwriting, image quality, unusual layouts, and multiple languages can reduce accuracy. Always consult the original page image when an exact reading matters.
  • Semantic search remains experimental. Its rankings are an additional discovery aid, not a complete or definitive set of relevant results, and highly ranked pages can sometimes be only broadly related.
  • This is an active prototype. Search coverage, transcriptions, functionality, and the interface may continue to change as additional archival material is processed and the system is improved.

← Back to results

Page 12 · DO #3938 · 296_Lowy_Bx3FF5_r

Collection
Bernard Lowy (1916–1992) papers
Item/Folder
Correspondence Herbaria - 1989-`90-`91; M. Torres, January 1988 – December 1991
Digital Object
DO #3938, page 12
Collection-level dates
1949–1990
Open PDF at page 12 ↗

Page transcription

ROYAL BOTANIC GARDEN EDINBURGH EH3 5LR

Dr B Lowy
Director
Mycological Herbarium
Botany Dept
Louisiana State University
Baton Rouge
LOUISIANA 70803
USA
10 December 1990

Dear Dr Lowy

You may remember that either I or Dr Ratter (I forget which) wrote to you in 1988 asking whether it would be possible to supply determinations of the fungi which you collected on the Ilha de Maracá in 1986. At the time we were working on a preliminary Vegetation survey report for the Royal Geographical Society's Maracá Rainforest Project, and you kindly sent a copy of a paper which you had published on some of the new species there. Apparently the majority of your 1000 collections had still to be identified.

At the moment Dr Ratter and I are working on the compilation of the complete ecological survey of the island, including geology, soils, botany, zoology etc. This is to be published as a book by the Manchester University Press next year. We are preparing a substantial chapter on the island's vegetation, in which we are hoping to include as comprehensive a species list as is presently possible. Unfortunately there were relatively few mycological specimens collected during the project itself, and if you happen to have a more complete list of determinations available now and would be happy for us to incorporate it, we would be extremely grateful. Of course any such contributions will be clearly acknowledged in the book.

Each of the topics included in this publication will be treated separately by their respective authors. Should you feel that it were possible to write a more detailed account of the fungi, this would be under your own name.

We are hoping that in order to integrate the contributions and broaden the horizons of the book, each author will provide text discussing the diversity, abundance, biogeographical position, environmental preferences, seasonal changes etc of the groups which they studied - where possible mentioning inter-relationships with other plant/animal groups. In case you are interested in doing this, I am enclosing a list of all of the fungi which have (to my knowledge) been collected on the island so far.

I paid a brief visit to Maracá in February of this year, and found it little changed. The research station is still in excellent condition, and Guttenberg now has a decent salary. Amazonas and Franzinete are based in Boa Vista, working for IBAMA (the new SEMA) as driver and secretary respectively.

I hope that this request is not an imposition, and look forward to hearing from you.

Yours sincerely
William Milliken