NATURAL-HISTORY AT THE CUTTING EDGE

Natural history is a vast database useful for the discovery of new bio logical resources and when the logic of evolutionary biology and ecolo gy is applied to it, an extraordinary diversity of commercial applicat ions are revealed. Examples show that organisms as unexpected as ants, spiders and molluscs provide proven or potential resources for produc ts as diverse as pharmaceuticals, high-tensile fibres and new construc tion materials while lowly worms and wasps provide services from envir onmental monitoring to biological control. These examples are the tip of the iceberg and a branch of ecological economics is proposed to dev elop the logical and systematic exploration of biodiversity for novel products and services. While the primary reasons for the conservation of biodiversity may be ethical and moral, the judicious use of natural history clearly demonstrates that the economic imperatives for the co nservation of all species are far greater than previously imagined.