Since 1984 the multidisciplinary studies in the plant family Umbelliferae in the Botanical Garden of Moscow State University (MSU) have been accompanied by creating of specialized computer databases. Up to now the databases GNOM on the nomenclature and geography of the World genera, CARUM on the karyotaxonomy, and ASIUM on taxonomy and distribution of Asian species of the family have been elaborated. GNOM contains the data on 1013 valid generic names, 463 of which are accepted. A reference-book "The genera of the Umbelliferae. A nomenclator" (1993) was based on GNOM. Now the principal information from GNOM is available via INTERNET at join WWW-site of the Information System Lab of the Computer Science Department and the Botanical Garden of MSU. CARUM contains information on chromosome numbers and karyotypes of 1712 species belonging to 337 genera. The monograph "Karyotaxonomic analysis in the Umbelliferae" is to be published soon, basing on CARUM. ASIUM contains complete data on protologues, typification, distribution, synonymy and essential references for 2043 accepted species (277 genera), distributed in Asia, a continent with the highest biodiversity of the family. All the databases are permanently maintained and upgraded in MS-DOS environment under FoxPro 2.6 on PC-486 (66 Mhz). They permit to obtain numerous secondary analytical characteristics based on their data.

Support: RFBR.

Botanical Garden & Computer Science Department, Moscow State
University, Moscow, 119899, Russia.
Tel. (095) 9393479, Fax (095)
9392450. E-mail pimenov@2.botgard.bio.msu.ru; leonowmw@cs.msu.su
URL: http://www.botanik.cs.msu.su