The Fossil Brachiopod Collection is one of the largest of its kind worldwide. With its move to the new building in the Mertonstraße (Jügelhaus) in 2018, the collection was completely reorganized and ordered according to the systematics of the revised ‘Treatise on invertebrate Palaeontology’.
The collection from the famous Hunsrück Slate Lagerstätte (Lower Devonian, Hunsrück, Rheinisches Schiefergebirge) offers deep insights in the world 400 Million years before our time; it includes specimens of arthropods, echinoderms and fishes showing minute details and soft parts that can be made visible by computer tomographics. The collection is completely available with photographs on the internet (in SeSam).
The X-ray collection Wilhelm Stürmer contains large-formatted photos of many Hunsrück Slate Fossils. The ‘Wetteldorfer Richtschnitt’ collections from the GSSP at Wetteldorf in the Eifel Hills contain bed-by-bed collections from the succession at the Lower/Middle Devonian boundary stratotype (GSSP) and comparative sections in the vicinity. Finally, the fossil molluscs (Gastropoda, Bivalvia, Cephalopoda, Scaphopoda), sponges,bryozoans and annelides with the focus on the Palaeozoic are curated in the section. The geologically younger (Cenozoic) and extant representatives of the Porifera, Bryozoa and Mollusca are curated, respectively, in the sections of Marine Invertebrates I, III and Malacology.
| Fossil Brachiopoda | 900,000 specimens (25,000 catalogued, 5,500 available in SeSam, 150 primary types). Focus: Palaeozoic, Rhenish Massif, North Africa (Rud. & E. Richter, H. Schmidt, W. Struve, P. Carls, G. Plodowski, P. Sartenaer, U. Jansen) |
| Fossil Gastropoda | 7,500 specimens (500 catalogued, 40 primary types) Focus: Palaeozoic, Devonian (G. Dahmer, D. Heidelberger) |
| Fossil Cephalopoda | 17,500 specimens (2.626 catalogued, 59 primary types) Focus: Palaeozoic (H. Matern, D. Korn, T. Becker), ceratite Collection (H. Penndorf, M. Urlichs & R. Mundlos, coll. Hornung), coleoids (Eduard Rüppell) |
| Fossil Bivalvia | 70,000 specimens (8,620 catalogued, 68 primary types) Focus: Palaeozoic (G. Dahmer); rudists from Iran and Afghanistan (K. Vogel); Ordovician, Spain; Wilckens, South Georgia |
| Fossil Porifera Receptaculitida Archaeocyathida | 3,000 specimens (500 catalogued, 30 primary types) Focus: Palaeozoic (K. Sdzuy, S. Rietschel), Mesozoic (Senowbary-Darian, D. Brückner) |
| Fossil Bryozoa | 2,000 specimens (870 catalogued, 13 primary types) |
| Fossil Scaphopoda | 350 specimens (2 primary types; catalogued, E. Yochelson) |
| Fossil Annelida | 200 specimens |
| Hunsrück Slate Collection | 955 specimens (100 % available in SeSam, photos available, 9 primary types) |
| Stratigraphic and Regional Collection Lower Devonian | 300,000 specimens, with regional focal points Rhenish Massif (Germany), Morocco, Belgium, France, Spain, Luxembourg, USA, Central Asia, China; personal collections of G. Fuchs, R. Werner, G. Plodowski, P. Carls, G.K.B. Alberti, U. Jansen |
| Collection “Wetteldorfer Richtschnitt” (GSSP of the Emsian-Eifelian boundary in the Eifel) | 100,000 specimens (in the underground depot) |
| X-Ray Collection, W. STÜRMER | 8,964 negatives (100 % available in SeSam, photos available) |
