Let goChristian Samperthrough the corridors ofSmithsonian National Museum of Natural Historyin Washington DC (USA) it is like releasing a child in a candy store. A child who also has the access key to each of the cabinets. For almost a decade, this 46-year-old biologist and conservationist born in Costa Rica and raised in Colombia has been at the helm of the world’s largest natural history museum. PhD from Harvard University, he is the creator of the famousEncyclopedia of Life. Our correspondent in the United States,Angela Posada-Swafford,spoke with him in his spacious office about the conservation challenges facing our society, what it means to be responsible for the 126 million objects in this extensive collection and why, now that the museum is at its best, it is time to quit. Starting in August, Samper will be thedirector of the Wildlife Conservation Society, one of the world’s leading environmental organizations, based in New York.
How does it feel to be the director of the largest natural history museum on the planet, a place that receives more than seven million visitors a year?
It is incredibly challenging because every day I learn something new. It is like remaining a student for life. I like walking around the museum and listening to people’s comments, and knowing that we are sharing all this research, all this knowledge with them. But most of all I enjoy visiting scientists in their laboratories and discovering something completely new that I did not know. I have always said that a scientist is someone with a child inside who is continually asking questions.
How would you describe your time at the museum in these almost 10 years, taking into account that in that period the museum received more than 150 million dollars for new exhibits, established a scholarship program and built new collections and laboratories?
I have grown a lot in this position. I have learned from my colleagues. And, especially, I learned about education. Because I am a scientist and I had worked with collections in Colombia but I had never done anything with exhibitions. The most important thing for me has been to learn how an exhibition is thought and how to design.
And in what moments do you intervene as director of the museum in the design of an exhibition?
I intervene at a strategic level when we sit down to choose what the topic is; for example, if we are going to want one about human evolution, or about the oceans, which were the cases in recent years. Then we convened a group of experts and educators, and we thought about what the fundamental concepts of the subject are. From there we identify what we have in the collections that we can use, and how we would couple it with design elements. And throughout this process we are doing evaluations with the public. That is why the development of an exhibition such asOceansit becomes a five-year project.
As an evolutionary biologist, what is the exhibition that best addresses the subject?
The Human Origins Room: Not only does it show evidence of change, but it talks about environmental changes and adaptation. I also like it because it makes the subject of evolution something personal. It shows us where we humans come from.
Is there a lot behind the scenes in a museum?
People generally think that the museum is just the public area. But 90% of this is behind the scenes, because they are research collections. Nor can they imagine the enormous amount of work behind each collection. We have a very large group of scientists working all over the world doing research. There are enough collections here to fill a lifetime of studios (or several) with these collections.
What does it take to be a Smithsonian researcher?
We are looking for scientists nationally and internationally who are asking good research questions, and using collections to answer them. Because what makes a museum great is the collection. It is one of the things that differentiates us from a university. We also have about 500 associated researchers, who are people who are in other entities and who want to have access to one of our collections. Our policy is that the collection is open free to any accredited researcher anywhere in the world. We also accept students.
I suppose there will be collections that are still unexploited, because of how large and complex they are?
Totally. And even from collections that have already been studied, new questions may arise. That’s the thing to remember: that science is constantly proposing novel hypotheses, and within a few decades one can go back to the same collection with a different tool to get a different answer as well. So part of our responsibility is to keep those collections forever.
Do you decide as a director what objects to get or buy?
This is reserved for the directors of each collection. Depending on the area, there are many ways we acquire. On the one hand, there is the field work (fossils, botanical specimens …). There are also exchanges, since we are a world reference center, so there are researchers who send us specimens to identify and deposit them here. Third, there are donations from people who have a collection of something interesting that they want to donate to the Smithsonian, such as jewelry. And fourthly, sometimes we send our scientists with money to go shopping at fairs like the one in Tucson, and they themselves acquire objects knowing what are the gaps in our collection.
You once wrote in Nature that it is more relevant to observe taxonomic loss than that of individual species and that for this reason we must “rethink biodiversity”.
From an evolutionary point of view, it is necessary to take into account the types of species and the levels of organization, that is, there are species that are very close to each other. If what you are looking for is to maximize diversity, not only the number of species counts but how they are related to each other. One of the initiatives that we are implementing now has to do with conserving all plant families, plant genera. And sometimes the problem is that we focus on preserving certain groups of the tree of life and forget entire branches. We need to add an evolutionary vision to the conservation issue.
What is the role of zoos in conservation?
Zoos have two major missions: the conservation of certain types of species that are disappearing under natural conditions – in fact we know of several that were saved thanks to the work of zoos, such as the American bison. The other is to generate public awareness. If you look at data for zoos, botanical gardens, and aquariums together, they have more visitors than all sporting events in the US.
Speaking of biodiversity, you are the father of the Encyclopedia of Life.
It’s my baby. And I declare responsible paternity. Five years ago we joined a group of institutions and people who wanted to give universal access to the knowledge of life on Earth. We made agreements with a large number of networks and scientific entities, and today there is information on a million species online. It is completely free, it is already in English, Arabic and Spanish, and we are working on a Chinese version. We are linking not only the species and image pages, but all the pre-existing literature, digitizing the libraries. And that is going to have a gigantic impact because it means that we can put all that information within the reach of a child in Bolivia or a student in the Canary Islands. The encyclopedia is armed with content contributions from reputable individuals around the world. It is a kind of Wikipedia but with a strong quality control. We don’t want to reinvent the wheel, but rather take advantage of all the information that already exists and begin to fill in the gaps. The project is going very well.
And all this is part of his life thanks to an expedition during his childhood, right?
Yes, I grew up in Bogotá. He was a boy scout and spent every weekend walking through fields in the vicinity near the city. But the key moment was when I was in school, when I had the opportunity to go on a couple of expeditions to the Colombian Pacific jungle, and it is one of those things that you either love or hate. I liked it. And I decided to study biology. Then, in my third year of university in Los Andes, I managed to do a one-year exchange at Harvard University.
And now director of the Wildlife Conservation Society begins to work, after a decade of improvements in the museum.
It’s the best time the museum has had since I arrived, and that’s exactly why I have to go (laughs). I think that after ten years there comes a point where the added value that you bring to an entity is not so high: it is healthy to start having another point of view. And it is a time when you also want to continue growing. Going to WCS is not a change of course because it still has to do with the environment.
On a personal level, as a biologist I love going out into the natural world, I am aware of the environmental tragedy that we are going through and I want to be able to dedicate more time to it. This will give me the opportunity not only to approach the scientific and educational aspect, but directly to do conservation in the field. I want to help leave for my two children, ages three and six, not just a world that we know better, but one in which many of these natural sites are actually preserved.
What does WCS do?
Of all the environmental NGOs, it is the one with the most serious scientific component. It has around 200 doctoral-level researchers doing fieldwork on important species, and they use that research to design conservation strategies. In doing so they have helped establish more than 150 protected areas around the world. Much progress has been made on the issue of terrestrial protected areas but we are very “off the hook” in the protection of marine areas. It is one of the great voids that exist in the world. Speaking of challenges and opportunities that exist at this moment: we have to reach 10% of the coastal marine world in protected areas. We are at less than 2%. I want to be one of the people who helps make that happen. I can do that better from the WCS.
Text: Angela Posada-Swafford
