Museum Finds 11 New Moth Species in Old Specimen
Natural History Museum scientists used a 170-year-old Wallace-collected specimen from Borneo to identify new species and revive a moth genus.
Updated on Nov. 7, 2026 in Life Sciences
Scientists at the Natural History Museum identified 11 new moth species using a specimen collected by Alfred Russel Wallace in Sarawak, Borneo, around 1855-1856. The work also revived the moth genus Topiris, which now includes 14 species.
Why it matters
The findings show how historical museum collections can still yield new biological knowledge when combined with modern genetic techniques. The specimen had earlier been dismissed as unworthy of further attention, underscoring how overlooked material can prove valuable.
The identification drew on a tiny piece of a moth's leg that yielded genetic information via a DNA sequencing technique being trialled at the Museum. The specimen's deteriorated condition made identification difficult, and it matches moths collected more recently in Brunei.
The players
Alfred Russel Wallace
A 19th-century British naturalist who collected the moth specimen during his travels in Southeast Asia and is known for independently developing a theory of evolution by natural selection.
Natural History Museum
A London-based museum whose extensive insect collection of about 13.5 million butterfly and moth specimens made the identification possible.
The details
Scientists compared a specimen label bearing the abbreviation 'SAR' with historical records and Wallace's account of collecting moths from a bungalow near Kuching between December 1855 and January 1856. The specimen was originally described in 1863, and in 1927 Edward Meyrick had recommended it be 'better neglected'.
Timeline
Wallace collected the specimen in Sarawak, Borneo, in 1855-1856.
The specimen was originally described in 1863.
Edward Meyrick recommended the specimen be neglected in 1927.
The Big Picture
The rediscovery shows how Wallace's 19th-century Borneo specimens, housed in the Natural History Museum's collection of roughly 100,000 species, can still reshape taxonomy today. It extends the long tradition of museum-based taxonomy into the genomic era, where tiny tissue samples now reopen questions set aside in 1927.
The approach of combining century-old specimens with new DNA sequencing could help researchers recover biological information from other museum holdings. Such methods may accelerate the cataloguing of species that have long sat unexamined in collection drawers.
The takeaway
Overlooked historical specimens can still hold new scientific value, so older collections are worth revisiting with modern tools.
Further reading
Explore more discoveries in Life Sciences to see how museum collections are being used in modern research.
Source note: This article includes information reported by The Times of India.
