Munich - The world's biggest collection of preserved butterflies has been safely moved to a bigger, new home in the southern German city of Munich, museum officials said Sunday.

Prize specimens from the 10-million-insect collection will go back on public display on Friday. They were netted over decades by German scientists and enthusiasts all over the globe and neatly pinned on cards at the Bavarian Zoological Collection ZSM museum.

It took several months to gingerly transport the fragile butterflies, which are now kept in 50,000 glass cases.

Chief conservator Axel Hausmann said the new space in the building would allow 100,000 species to be put on public display at any one time.

Friday's re-opening of the collection will also feature an award to Zoltan Varga, a Hungarian professor who donated his huge collection of Noctuidae butterflies to the ZSM.

Varga, who collected them on several expeditions to Central Asian mountain ranges, will receive the Ritter von Spix Medal.(dpa)