Conservation of biodiversity through taxonomy, data publication, and collaborative infrastructures

Abstract

Taxonomy is the foundation of biodiversity science because it furthers discovery of new species. Globally, there have never been so many people involved in naming species new to science. The number of new marine species described per decade has never been greater. Nevertheless, it is estimated that tens of thousands of marine species, and hundreds of thousands of terrestrial species, are yet to be discovered; many of which may already be in specimen collections. However, naming species is only a first step in documenting knowledge about their biology, biogeography, and ecology. Considering the threats to biodiversity, new knowledge of existing species and discovery of undescribed species and their subsequent study are urgently required. To accelerate this research, we recommend, and cite examples of, more and better communication: use of collaborative online databases; easier access to knowledge and specimens; production of taxonomic revisions and species identification guides; engagement of nonspecialists; and international collaboration. "Data-sharing" should be abandoned in favor of mandated data publication by the conservation science community. Such a step requires support from peer reviewers, editors, journals, and conservation organizations. Online data publication infrastructures (e.g., Global Biodiversity Information Facility, Ocean Biogeographic Information System) illustrate gaps in biodiversity sampling and may provide common ground for long-term international collaboration between scientists and conservation organizations.

Methods for the Study of Marine Biodiversity

“…Generally, these are only widely available for vertebrates (Costello et al , 2015b. To identify invertebrates often requires numerous papers to be obtained, sometimes in different languages.…”

Rediscovering a forgotten canid species

“…Biodiversity research, as well as conservation studies, is only valuable when built on solid taxonomic work [18,19]. The erroneous merging of two distinct species (the African wolf and the golden jackal) into one as 'golden jackal' has resulted in confusing phylogenetic trees and false interpretations of intraspecific biological variation and evolutionary history.…”

A vision for global monitoring of biological invasions

“…Digital infrastructure for big data on Essential Variables is under development (Canhos et al, 2015;Jetz et al, 2012;Nativi et al, 2015). The Global Biodiversity Information Facility (GBIF) and Ocean Biogeographic Information System (OBIS) are international infrastructures for organizing data of species presences in space and time (Costello et al, 2013(Costello et al, , 2015. Map of Life (MOL) integrates a variety of species distribution data types, including inventories, with the goal of providing best-possible species range information (Jetz et al, 2012).…”

“…It is also often possible (such as with adequate or targeted alien species occurrence data) to estimate it from existing information sources(Costello et al, 2015;McGeoch et al, 2010).…”