GENERALDIREKTION DER STAATLICHE NATURWISSENSCHAFTLICHEN SAMMLUNGEN BAYERNS

Their core work

SNSB is the administrative body governing Bavaria's state natural science collections — a network of research museums and institutes in Munich holding millions of biological, geological, mineralogical, and paleontological specimens accumulated over centuries. Their scientific staff conduct active research in taxonomy, systematics, and biodiversity documentation, and their physical collections serve as irreplaceable reference infrastructure for genomics and comparative biology projects worldwide. In EU research, SNSB contributes specimen-based expertise, curatorial knowledge, and institutional links to LMU Munich, which allow them to serve as a host organization for postdoctoral researchers. They are not a general research contractor but a highly specialized natural history institution whose value lies in what they hold and what their curators know.

What they specialise in

How they've shifted over time

With only two projects both starting within a single year (2017–2018), meaningful temporal evolution is difficult to establish. The available early-period keywords cluster entirely around fellowship and researcher mobility themes — incoming and outgoing postdoctoral fellows, international and cross-sectoral mobility — drawn from LMUResearchFellows. The second project, IGNITE, carries no captured keywords in the dataset, so the apparent absence of recent-period signal reflects a data gap rather than a genuine shift in focus. What the pairing does reveal is a dual identity: SNSB operates simultaneously as a scientific research institution (genomics, invertebrate biology) and as an LMU-affiliated host body for researcher training, suggesting their EU engagement spans both research content and academic infrastructure roles.

SNSB's participation in IGNITE points toward growing engagement with molecular and genomic methods applied to natural history collections — a field where physical specimen archives are becoming central infrastructure for large-scale biodiversity genomics, making SNSB a natural fit for future consortia in this space.

How they like to work

SNSB has never coordinated an H2020 project, appearing only as a partner or third party — a pattern consistent with an institution that brings specialized collection-based expertise to consortia rather than driving project strategy. Their 42 unique partners across 17 countries is high relative to just 2 projects, which reflects the large-consortium structure of MSCA-ITN networks rather than independent relationship-building. Working with SNSB likely means engaging a reliable specialist contributor who provides access to collections, curatorial expertise, or researcher hosting capacity, not a project management hub.

Despite only two projects, SNSB reached 42 unique consortium partners across 17 countries, almost entirely through the wide network structures inherent to MSCA training networks and COFUND programs. Their geographic spread is European in breadth but Munich-anchored in practice, with LMU Munich as the central institutional relationship.

What sets them apart

SNSB manages one of the largest and most historically deep natural science collections in the German-speaking world, giving researchers access to specimen-based reference data that no laboratory can replicate. As a state public body institutionally linked to LMU Munich, they offer both governmental stability and academic credibility — relevant for consortia that need a German public institution as a partner. For projects in biodiversity genomics, invertebrate biology, or museum informatics, SNSB brings something genuinely scarce: centuries of curated physical collections combined with active research staff who use them.

Highlights from their portfolio

• IGNITE
  The only project for which SNSB received EC funding (EUR 249,216), directly matching their core scientific identity in invertebrate biology and representing their clearest signal of research-active EU engagement.
• LMUResearchFellows
  A long-running MSCA-COFUND program (2017–2023) that reveals SNSB's role as an institutional host within the LMU Munich ecosystem, relevant for researchers seeking cross-sectoral or outgoing fellowship placements in natural sciences.