Semantic Web Informatics for Species in Space and Time

圣菲研究所获得了一笔拨款，通过开发和实施成熟的新兴信息技术，特别是与语义网相关的信息技术，扩展、集成和自动化对生态数据的访问和分析。这将通过为几个大型生态数据库开发类似于“mashup”的集成web服务和开发由这些服务支持的图形用户界面来“横向”完成，这些服务可以访问不同类型的数据，无缝地将数据输入工作流系统，并以自动记录的方式进行集成分析。这些活动将被整合起来，以便用户可以很容易地获得基于分类、生境、地理和营养关系等概念的各种生态数据和分析。本项目开发的图形用户界面将通过从调查数据库中提取植物丰度数据，从在线食物网络数据库中识别相关的本地食草动物及其体型，并从全球种群动态数据库中分析这些食草动物的同期时间序列，从而实现植物-食草动物动态相关数据的综合分析。该项目的产品将通过创造新技术来改变生物学，这些新技术用于引入深度功能信息学“混接”，这些混接技术使用更友好的集成ui来协同现有的信息学资源。更广泛的影响包括加强计算机与自然科学相结合的研究和教育基础设施；增加代表性不足的学生和研究人员的作用；通过各种媒体、会议和专业网络以及多层次的课程活动进行广泛传播和外联。该项目将与太平洋生态信息学和计算生态学实验室、马里兰大学、学院公园、旧金山州立大学、亚利桑那大学和微软研究院合作开展。关于这个项目的更多信息可以在实验室网站上找到：http://www.foodwebs.org。

The Santa Fe Institute is awarded a grant to extend, integrate, and automate access to and analysis of ecological data by developing and implementing proven and emerging information technologies, particularly those related to the Semantic Web. This will be done "horizontally" by developing integrative web services somewhat similar to "mash-ups" for several large ecological databases and by developing graphical user interfaces enabled by these services to access disparate types of data, seamlessly feed the data into workflow systems, and conduct integrated analyses in an automatically documented manner. These activities will be integrated so that users can easily access a wide variety of ecological data and analyses based on concepts such as taxonomy, habitat, geography, and trophic relations. Graphical user interfaces developed in this project will enable integrated analysis of data related to plant-herbivore dynamics by drawing on plant abundance data from survey databases, identifying associated local herbivores and their body sizes from online food web databases, and analyzing contemporaneous time series of those herbivores drawn from databases on global populations dynamics. The products of this project will transform biology by creating new technologies used to introduce deeply functional informatics "mash-ups" that synergize existing informatics resources using more user-friendly integrative UIs. Broader impacts include an enhanced infrastructure for research and education at the interface of computer and natural sciences; increased roles for underrepresented students and researchers; and wide dissemination and outreach through diverse media, meetings and professional networks as well as curricular activities at multiple levels. The project will be carried out in collaboration with the Pacific Ecoinformatics and Computational Ecology Lab, University of Maryland, College Park, San Francisco State University, the University of Arizona, and Microsoft Research. Further information about this project may be found at the lab website: http://www.foodwebs.org.