Institute of Biology

Mexico City, Mexico, Mexico

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The Institute of Biology (Instituto de Biología, IB) is a prominent research center of the National Autonomous University of Mexico (UNAM), founded in 1929 and located in the Pedregal de San Ángel area on UNAM's main campus in Ciudad Universitaria, Coyoacán, Mexico City, easily accessible via the Metro Ciudad Universitaria station. The institute's primary mission is studying biodiversity from the perspective of Systematics, focusing on the origin, maintenance, interactions, geographical distribution, current composition, rational use, and conservation of biological diversity in Mexico and worldwide. It houses Mexico's National Biological Collections, including the National Herbarium and ten national zoological collections of animals, plants, and fungi, making it the country's most important repository of biological specimens. The Institute consists of five academic units comprising two departments (Zoology and Botany), UNAM's Botanical Garden, and two field research stations—one in the high evergreen forest of Veracruz state and another in the low deciduous forest of Jalisco state.