Lucknow: The National Botanical Research Institute (NBRI) here is setting up a digital herbarium through which about 250,000 plant specimens would be made available on-line to scientists across the globe.

"In order to facilitate research work, we decided to set up the herbarium that will provide the desired plant specimen at the click of the mouse," Tariq Husain, a scientist in the taxonomy and biodiversity division of the institute, told sources.

The upcoming herbarium would help scientists from foreign countries, who have no other option but to visit the institute for collecting the plant specimen, he added.

The first-of-its kind digital herbarium in the country is being set up on the lines of Britain's Royal Botanic Gardens, scientists said.

For setting up the herbarium, at present, about 4,000 specimens of different plants have been scanned for their digital version, they added.

They digital version of plant specimens would soon be made available on NBRI's website nbri-lko.org IANS