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 183 · DO #4666 · 231_Rogers_Bx2FF27_r

Collection
David James Rogers (1918–2007) papers
Item/Folder
Taximetrics Course - Student Reports, 1966–1968
Digital Object
DO #4666, page 183
Collection-level dates
1948–1977
Open PDF at page 183 ↗

Page transcription

PAGE 8

our classification. What is it intrinsically, what are the intrinsic characters
of this plant which make all of these plants related and unrelated and everything else? But I can't see how except that's purely arbitrary you can
separate the intrinsic from the extrinsic. (Henry) It is in many ways arbitrary,
just as it is in trying to classify a collection of books, but there are certain
characters which are a part of the genetic makeup of that plant. All of sorts of
accidents can happen to the plant otherwise. We do have to at some point make
what is largely an arbitrary decision. Many of these things I have mentioned
here, for instance, x perfectly good for special classification. If I want an
ecological classification, I would use ecological data, but we have to set up
some sort of classification for plants that is of use to a great number of different individuals. (Student) And this is not the special? (Henry) And this
is not the special. (Student) You define special as being only for one group
whereas general botanical classification is..... (Henry) Good for the greatest
possible number of different uses. In regard to your point you brought up,
this is a little bit perhaps off the subject, but there
is a certain insect which they were able to feed on certain plants in Czechoslovakia, they brought some of this same insect material to Harvard. At Harvard
this insect would never get out of its larval stage. It would reach an adult
stage which was non-sexual with many larval characters. There was considerable
amount of time spent trying to determine why this insect when brought over to
the United States under the same laboratory conditions the same,
would not mature become sexually viable. It was finally tied down to the paper
that was being used for the food that this insect fed on, and this paper was
from Douglas fir. Apparently, all the paper that they tried whether it was magazine paper or anything else as I recall, all had some origin of Douglas fir.
And there was something retained from the Douglas fir that was limiting this one
insect. The other insects were raised fine in the same genus, just this one
had a limiting effect this one insect. This is really not comparable information.