T4-S1. Mineralogy and Museums – collection, presentation, outreach

Elena Bonaccorsi (elena.bonaccorsi@unipi.it)
Birgit Kreher-Hartmann (birgit.kreher@uni-jena.de)

In the fast developing world, museums are facing new challenges, involving their capacity to address all ages people and share culture and knowledge. The mineralogical museums have a long tradition of combining high quality scientific research with the communication of science to a wide audience. To achieve this, many museums establish partnerships with schools, universities, educational agencies in the local communities and experiment with new ways of responding to people’s needs.

The session is open to contributions which enlight the more innovative aspects of the mineralogical museum life, including their efforts to better communicate the importance of minerals in natural systems and their wide applications in technology, industry and environment. Although the focus is on mineralogy, contributions about other general aspects of public outreach in geosciences and planetology are also welcome.