KDI: Knowledge Networking of Biodiversity Information

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This Knowledge and Distributed Intelligence initiative will enable knowledge networking of biological diversity information. We comprise a cross-sector, multidisciplinary, intellectual consortium of systematists, ecologists, earth systems scientists, natural resource managers and computer scientists. Our research and infrastructure foci are on the quantification, analysis and prediction of biodiversity. There are several thrust areas (a-g): (a) high-performance network access to biological collection and classification databases through the implementation of international information retrieval protocols and metadata profiles, including a development collaboration with the U.S. Integrated Taxonomic Information System (ITIS), and (b) the integration of those museum databases with other earth systems sciences data such as terrain and climate information, for the predictive modeling and visualization of species distributions and related biodiversity phenomena. We will initiate two test bed research projects to assess: (c) the ecosystem function of biodiversity; and (d) the pattern and processes governing the decline in amphibian populations worldwide. We will also (e) train the next generation of biodiversity informatics scientists, and (f) deliver the database access and species distribution analysis tools we will produce to students and the public on the Internet. Finally, as part of the above research, we will (g) study the process of collaboration and synergistic behavior among investigators, organizations and communities across the net.In this project we will deploy a research computing architecture for accessing, integrating and analyzing authoritative biotic and taxonomic data associated with the 3 billion specimens of animals and plants archived worldwide in biological museums and herbaria. This enormous information store, acquired during 300 years of biological exploration of the earth, documents the known life of the planet, about 1.7 million species--their history, global composition, identity, spatial distribution and ecology. Access to and use of this data are fundamental if we are to meet one of the grand challenges for the 21st century: understanding the functional relationships of earth's biological diversity to global environmental systems. The urgent need for this knowledge increases as the conversion of natural to human-managed systems accelerates the decline of biological diversity. Knowledge networking of biodiversity information will bring the intellectual content of the world's biological collections into currency for science and society for achieving a better understanding of biological diversity and its role in global environmental systems, and for informing global environmental management and policy.