1. Global Biodiversity Information Facility GLOBAL BIODIVERSITY INFORMATION FACILITY Meredith A. Lane CODATA/ERPANET Workshop: Scientific Data Selection & Retention 15 December 2003 WWW.GBIF.ORG

2. Global Biodiversity Information Facility True bioinformatics … ecoinformatics “bioinformatics” genomics proteomics biodiversity informatics

3. Global Biodiversity Information Facility What are GBIF’s data ? l These data must be digitised in order to be shared and fully utilised l Primary observation data that have been accumulating over 250 to 300 years l Associated notes, recordings, observational databases, etc. l Label data on ~ 1.5 B specimens in ~ 6000 natural history collections worldwide

4. Global Biodiversity Information Facility Biological Data Domain Persistent ? digital and physical data stores, moderately accessible Migration of legacy data, metadata generation, taxonomy (species) 80% ? digital Ecological & Ecosystem Data Persistent physical data stores, accessible with difficulty Digitisation, migration of legacy data, indexing <5% digital Species- & Specimen Data Persistent digital, universally accessible data stores Data migration, cleansing, vouchering, taxonomy (gene & species) 95% digital Molecular Sequence & Gene/Genome Data Subdomain Digital Status Greatest Informatics Problems Data Status

5. Global Biodiversity Information Facility Subdomains could contribute to each other… Taxonomy, Registry, “member” information Model accessibility mechanism, analytical tools Context, “member” interaction, link to abiotic data & GIS Model accessibility mechanism, “member” information Context, analytical tools Taxonomy, Registry, Context Eco- Species Gene EcosystemSpeciesGene

6. Global Biodiversity Information Facility What is GBIF ? GBIF is a megascience facility aimed at l Making the world’s primary species occurence data freely and universally available via the Internet, l sharing these scientific data for society, science and a sustainable future

7. Global Biodiversity Information Facility Why was GBIF established ? l Both biodiversity and biodiversity data are unevenly distributed around the world: Developing World Biodiversity Biodiversity Data Developed World l GBIF was established, in large part, to redress the inequality of data distribution

8. Global Biodiversity Information Facility GBIF’s focus is on primary data l Primary data, because they are difficult or too time-consuming to access, are at present not often used in natural resource policy or management decisions l Primary data that are available digitally can significantly improve decision-making and research CONABIO’s map of 700,000 plant specimen records drawn from 25 institutions

9. Global Biodiversity Information Facility l To undertake biodiversity informatics activities that must be accomplished on a worldwide basis (electronic catalogue, information architecture, coordination) l To take on tasks not being attempted by other initiatives but which would be of benefit to those initiatives (e.g. CHM, GTI) l To make biodiversity databases interoperable among themselves and with molecular, genetic, ecological and other types of databases, thus increasing the value of all of them Why was GBIF established ?

10. Global Biodiversity Information Facility GBIF’s area of data responsibility… l The return on the investments made in the other areas will be enhanced by the data and interoperability provided by GBIF. l The types of data that GBIF will provide are unique; there is no duplication of any existing effort.

11. Global Biodiversity Information Facility GBIF contribution to interoperability Example: Until now, it has not been possible to combine data from GenBank with specimen and ecological data from other sources without painstaking work by a person. With GBIF’s components in place, data can be drawn directly from different sources with a single query. Compiled specimen, genetic, and ecological information

12. Global Biodiversity Information Facility True bioinformatics... Realbioinformatics

13. Global Biodiversity Information Facility Data selection and appraisal… l Project driven l Economic importance l Conservation importance l Research interest l Philosophical approach of collection curators l Funding availability l Understanding of funding bodies

14. Global Biodiversity Information Facility Data retention… l Natural History Museums have been retaining these data in physical form for hundreds of years l GBIF philosophy is to leave the digital data in the care of the holders of the physical data l However, this means that the NHMs must be supported

15. Global Biodiversity Information Facility Data retention problems… l Data sets generated & maintained by individuals (who maintains?) l Data sets that are not collections-based (institution maintains?) l Data sets that lack metadata (who adds, ex post facto?) l Data migration, curation, cleansing, etc.

16. Global Biodiversity Information Facility WWW.GBIF.ORG