Horizon Europe project Blue-Cloud 2026 to enhance Open Science in support of ocean protection and restoration

Blue-Cloud 2026

Over the past decades, Europe has developed an impressive capability for aquatic environmental observation, data-handling and sharing, modelling and forecasting. This builds upon national environmental observation and monitoring networks and programmes, complemented with EU infrastructures such as the Copernicus satellite observation programme and related thematic services, the European Marine Observation and Data Network , as well as a range of environmental European RIs and major R&D projects. 

Within this framework, since October 2019, the pilot Blue-Cloud project combined both the interests of the European Open Science Cloud (EOSC), aiming to provide a virtual environment with open and seamless access to services for storage, management, analysis and re-use of research data, across borders and disciplines, and the blue research communities by developing a collaborative web-based environment providing simplified access to an unprecedented wealth of multi-disciplinary datasets from observations, analytical services, and computing facilities essential for blue science. 

Funded by Horizon Europe, Blue-Cloud 2026 aims at a further evolution of this pilot ecosystem into a Federated European Ecosystem to deliver FAIR & Open data and analytical services, instrumental for deepening research of oceans, EU seas, coastal & inland waters. It develops a thematic marine extension to EOSC for open web-based science, in support of the EU Green Deal, UN SDGs, the EU Destination Earth initiative, and the EU Mission “Restore Our Ocean and Waters by 2030”.

Blue-Cloud 2026 as a key link for EOSC and the Digital Twin of the Ocean

Over the course of 42 months starting in January 2023, the consortium is going to integrate more blue analytical services into the Blue-Cloud Virtual Research Environment, configure new thematic Virtual Labs, improving services for uptake of new data sets from a multitude of data originators and major e-infrastructures, and for discovery and access to their structured data collections.

The existing Blue-Cloud framework is already home to one of the most mature communities in EOSC, and can provide practical examples to younger communities on a variety of aspects ranging from interoperability to data federation, from FAIR practices to cross-domain interaction.

Blue-Cloud 2026 is co-coordinated by CNR and Trust-IT Services, with MARIS as technical coordinator, counting on a core team of partners such as VLIZ (focal point of LifeWatch Belgium), Ifremer, Mercator Ocean International, Seascape Belgium. Overall it mobilises a solid, multidisciplinary, committed team of 40 partners across 13 EU countries. The three-day kick-off meeting in Pisa, Italy, was hosted by CNR (National Research Council of Italy) in collaboration with Trust-IT, and provided the first official opportunity for the consortium to meet in person, take stock of the work performed in the pilot project and plan the key upcoming activities towards a successful implementation of the Blue-Cloud framework by 2026.

Read the full press release here.

Follow Blue-Cloud 2026 on Twitter, LinkedIn and YouTube.

‘SeaWomen’ expedition studying orcas and whales above the Arctic circle

SeaWomen expedition

This winter, LifeWatch Belgium provided a key contribution to the citizen science initiative ‘SeaWomen’, an expedition studying marine ecosystem change, orca and whale behaviour in northern Norway, 350 kilometres north of the Arctic Circle, during the winter herring run.

The expedition was unique in many ways. The international team of 34 was exclusively women, non-binary and two-spirit peoples, thereby empowering women and minority groups. In addition, the team represented very diverse backgrounds and skillsets that enabled an interdisciplinary programme of activity, connecting marine and wider environmental science with art, photography, storytelling and more, with the core aim of collecting new knowledge about marine ecosystems in the region and collectively raising awareness about the ocean, and the effects of climate change on the natural world.

LifeWatch Belgium and the Flanders Marine Institute (VLIZ), including Dr Elisabeth Debusschere, contributed expertise and equipment to the ‘SeaWomen’ expedition, including the loaning of a Soundtrap HF 600 (Ocean instrument), a hydrophone to monitor underwater sound, marine mammal and other marine life vocalisations. This complemented a behaviour programme focused on killer whales (Orcinus orca) and included in-water winter snorkelling to obtain photos, videos and observations of the orcas and whales, together with marine environmental measurements including ocean physics (temperature and salinity profiles) and eDNA samples.

Dr Kate Larkin (marine expert at the European Marine Observation and Data Network Secretariat) was also onboard: “This expedition was a completely new approach to positive climate action. All of the women onboard were volunteers, with a common motivation to increase knowledge and societal understanding about the Ocean, and how the Ocean and marine ecosystem is changing as a result of human impact, ranging from climate change to human activities at sea such as fishing, tourism, shipping and more. It was a pleasure to collaborate with VLIZ and LifeWatch Belgium together with other partners and the diverse team of talented women, to make this expedition a reality.”

This article was originally posted on LifeWatch Belgium by Dr Kate Larkin (EMODnet) and Dr Elisabeth Debusschere (VLIZ).

Call for nominations for the WoRMS Top-Ten Marine Species of 2022

WoRMS Marine Species 2022

Once again, taxonomists have continued to publish many wonderful new species throughout last year. With the end of 2022 it is time to think about nominations for The WoRMS Top Ten Marine Species of 2022!

The aim of this list is to highlight the fascinating discoveries of the numerous new marine species being made every year, to the wider public. The 2021 winners span the tree of life, from coccolithophores to jellyfish to whales – see the full 2021 list here.

WoRMS (run by VLIZ, focal point of LifeWatch Belgium) plans to release the list to coincide with World Taxonomist Appreciation Day – 19 March!  If you were unaware of this celebration of all the work that Taxonomists do, you can find more here, and here.  

Please submit your nominations for your favorite species via this form. You are welcome to share this message with colleagues!

The species must have been published in 2022 (validly published between 01/01/2022 and 31/12/2022), must be marine, and can be a fossil species.

Please include the completed form and:

  • A pdf of the paper in which the species was described.
  • At least one good image of the species (with copyright and ownership information).

Good examples will have a compelling story behind the description, e.g. rare or unusual morphology, an interesting name, importance to society e.g for conservation/ medical importance/ toxic/ dangerous.  

WoRMS also needs help deciding on the final list. Self-nomination for the decision panel is welcome.  The decisions will be made via email discussion/vote.  

Please send your nominations, offers to volunteer to join the decision committee, or questions to info@marinespecies.org with the subject ‘Top-Ten Marine Species’.

But hurry! The closing date for submission of nominations is Friday 3 February 2023 to enable the decision and preparation of the pages in time for 19 March 2023.

Celebrating 15 Years of WoRMS

WoRMS 15 years

In 2007, the digitally available European Register of Marine Species (ERMS) expanded into a World Register of Marine Species, et voila, WoRMS was born. WoRMS is hosted by VLIZ, which is the national focal point for LifeWatch Belgium. In 2022, WoRMS can be seen as the number one authoritative classification and catalogue of marine names.

WoRMS is managed by a small Data Management Team (DMT) and an elected Steering Committee (SC), but the actual driving force behind the high-quality content of WoRMS is the Editorial Board. Completing and correcting WoRMS requires an enormous effort and is entirely dependent on the expertise and time of the editors. On top of that, it is a race against time as species are at risk of disappearing due to changing environmental conditions such as warming, pollution and acidification, before they are discovered.

To celebrate its 15th birthday and 15 years of collaboration with (taxonomic) experts all over the globe, WoRMS designed an exclusive t-shirt, with proceeds used to coordinate and disseminate funds to the WoRMS editors. With the funds raised, editors will be able to continue to fill gaps in coverage, expand the content and enhance the quality of taxonomic databases, attract interns and students to assist in the verification of taxonomic information, and purchase scientific literature.

And there’s more! Check out all the stories below on the LifeWatch Belgium website in celebration of 15 years of WoRMS!

2 – Get to know the WoRMS editors here!

3 – The growth of WoRMS over the years

4 – Developing the database

5 – Setting priorities to address gaps

6 – Behind the scenes

7 – Taxonomy – a science, an art, or a battleground?

8 – The challenge of author names

9 – Dark literature

10 – Type localities

11 – Endless possibilities

12 – Supporting the volunteers

13 – Beyond classical taxonomy

14 – Who uses WoRMS?

15 – Not reinventing the wheel

Marine Regions Launches Extended Continental Shelves Dataset

Extended Continental Shelves Dataset

Marine Regions, the database managed by focal point of LifeWatch Belgium, VLIZ, is proud to have launched the first version of the Extended Continental Shelves dataset. This latest dataset contains the portion of the continental shelf that extends beyond 200 Nautical Miles. Similar to the Exclusive Economic Zones dataset, it consists of both the outer limits of these areas and their polygon representations. Marine Regions is a standard list of marine georeferenced place names and areas.

How does it work?

The Marine Regions Gazetteer is a standard list of marine georeferenced place names and areas. Beside this list, shapefiles of Maritime Boundaries are created and/or shared. The Marine Regions Gazetteer provides the link between the species registers and the species occurrence databases in the LifeWatch Species Information Backbone. Various web services of Marine Regions are part of the LifeWatch Belgium e-lab.

Please contact info@marineregions.org if your organisation is interested in contributing to Marine Regions.

More detailed information about the dataset can be found in the original article on the LifeWatch Belgium website.

Keeping Up with LifeWatch Belgium

LifeWatch Belgium

There’s been a lot going on at LifeWatch Belgium over summer 2022, so please flick through some of our favourite news stories from the LifeWatch Belgium website, where you can find the full versions of these featured articles.

Taxonomy and beyond: ecological trait information in Aphia and WoRMS

In 2018, the WoRMS Steering Committee identified “documenting relevant species traits” as one of the content priorities for WoRMS (hosted by the national focal point for LifeWatch Belgium, VLIZ). The relevance of traits and their integration with the taxonomy of WoRMS however already dates back to 2015, when Costello et al., 2015 prioritised 10 marine species traits to document: Taxonomy, Environment, Geography, Depth, Body size, Substratum, Mobility, Skeleton, Diet and Reproduction.

Taxonomy, which is not actually a trait, is the main goal of WoRMS, and geography and depth are covered by the distribution module in WoRMS. Environment and body size were considered as the most straightforward traits of this list; meaning this information is easy to find rapidly and can be applied across all taxa in WoRMS. Therefore, it was decided to first focus on collecting information for these two traits in WoRMS. For a long time, environment information has been included in WoRMS as the “environment flag”. This flag indicates whether a species is marine, brackish, freshwater and/or terrestrial. In addition, the “functional group” trait documents whether a species belongs to the benthos, plankton, nekton, etc.

Before 2019, both functional group and body size were documented in Aphia and WoRMS to some extent, but not systematically, and not for all species. To complement this trait information, the WoRMS Data Management Team started a “traits data mining exercise” in 2019. Thanks to the positive responses of many editors, environment is now 99.5% complete, functional group 76%, qualitative body size 45%, and quantitative body size 9%. These are the numbers for the accepted species in Aphia. Looking at the accepted, extant, marine species, the numbers are even higher: 100% complete for environment, 81% for functional group, 47% for qualitative body size, and 17% for quantitative body size. More statistics can be found here. Definitions of all traits and values currently available in WoRMS and Aphia can be consulted here. If you want to help in the completion of these traits, please contact info@marinespecies.org.

The Species Information Backbone, the development of which is supported by LifeWatch Belgium, aims at bringing together taxonomic and species-related data.

Original story here. Image credit: Pieterjan Verhelst, image available here.

The LifeWatch Data Cloud has been launched!

The LifeWatch Data Cloud provides an overview of biodiversity and ecosystem data and data products, interactive viewers to interact with the data, an analysis platform (R Studio environment) and code to analyse a variety of data. In the background, the LifeWatch Data Cloud is using the Flemish Supercomputer Center (VSC) resources to provide the users with a performant infrastructure. The initial idea of the LifeWatch Data Cloud was raised during LifeWatch Maritime Industry Advisory Board meetings organised in collaboration with the Blue Cluster, a network of Blue Economy players in Flanders. There was high demand from the maritime industry for a clear and user-friendly platform to consult all data and data products to be able use them for their company-specific applications. Since LifeWatch ERIC offers much more than marine data and tools, and wants to offer this service to other users as well, the cloud was expanded to include terrestrial and freshwater products and is now available to a variety of users.

For the User Day of the Flemish Supercomputer Center (VSC), which took place at Ghent University on 22 May 2022, Lennert Schepers from LifeWatch Flanders presented the LifeWatch Data Cloud and two use cases that are using the LifeWatch Data Cloud: (1) a scientific study that models plankton interactions and (2) the European Tracking Network community that uses the LifeWatch Data Cloud to analyse the movement and migration of aquatic animals at a pan-european scale. The presentation is available here and the aftermovie is available on the website of the VSC.

You are encouraged to try out the LifeWatch Data Cloud for your own applications. Please feel free to contact info@lifewatch.be if you have questions or need help. The LifeWatch Data Cloud was developed by VLIZ in the framework of the Flemish contribution to LifeWatch ERIC (funded by FWO), with support of the Blue Cluster and the Flemish Supercomputer Center (VSC).

Original story here.

Searching for synergies between IMEV and LifeWatch VLIZ

Plankton imagery instruments, deployed in situ or in the lab, can reveal abundance, biomass and size spectra of plankton and marine particles, improving our ability to study plankton community composition and their small-scale spatial distribution. Thanks to technological advancement in imagery, many marine research centres are acquiring an increasing number of instruments and data and are becoming highly specialised in this field. In this situation, collaboration among research stations that are using the same methods, instruments and similar workflows are key to meet a common goal: to produce interoperable and high quality imagery datasets from which biologically and ecologically meaningful plankton observations can be derived.

From 18 – 20 July 2022 a team of plankton imagery specialists from the Laboratoire d’Océanographie de Villefranche (LOV), the Quantitative Imagery Platform (PIQv) and the Center for Planktonic Collections (CCPv) from the Institut de la mer de Villefranche,  Sorbonne Université-CNRS, in France, visited the LifeWatch VLIZ team in Ostend. During the 3-day meeting, both teams shared their expertise, discussed data acquisition, processing and management, identified synergies among their respective projects and future collaborations, among others. It was a very fruitful meeting with action points to follow up in the coming months, until the next time when, hopefully, the team from Ostend will visit Villefranche sur mer. 

Imaging data and sensors acquired at VLIZ are part of the Flemish contribution to LifeWatch ERIC.

Original story here.

New Actiniaria Portal within WoRMS

Actiniaria portal

Actiniaria – or sea anemones – are now accessible through their very own portal within the World Register of Marine Species (WoRMS), an initiative whose data management team is supported by LifeWatch Belgium. The information in the new World List of Actiniaria contains information rescued from the Hexacorallians of the World Database of the late Daphne Fautin, and the portal’s launch is partially linked to the last phase of integrating all information from the Hexacorallians of the World database into WoRMS.

The benefit of this is that this data can now be freely accessible through a solid platform with dedicated maintenance and the promise to stay online indefinitely. A treasure of extra information has been added to the different groups within the Hexacorals in WoRMS, including the addition of 1,842 names, 2,177 original descriptions, 25,312 distributions, 48,649 specimen records and many more additional references and vernaculars. And as the involved editors – Meg Daly & Estefania Rodriguez – also aimed for more visibility for the Actiniaria, a dedicated portal for this group has now been launched, with a very similar look-and-feel as the already existing portal of the World List of Scleractinia.

The data integration is also a contribution to the WoRMS-endorsed project within the UN Ocean Decade, where WoRMS continues to support not only scientists, but everyone who makes use of species names, including policymakers, industry and the public at large. Providing a separate portal for this species group provides it with a wider visibility for a larger audience.

This news item was adapted from an article on the LifeWatch Belgium website.

ZEEKERWETEN, the citizen science festival on the Belgian coastline

Citizen science can play a major role in data collection and processing. LifeWatch Belgium always champions greater collaboration between scientists and citizens because it enhances research and strengthens support among the wider public. The LifeWatch VLIZ initiatives ‘SeaWatch-B’ and the annual ‘Big Seashell Survey’ are good examples of this invaluable citizen-scientists cross-fertilisation. In order to give people a taste of this kind of initiative, on Sunday 8 May 2022, the Flanders Marine Institute (VLIZ) organised, with many other partners, the first citizen science festival on the Belgian coastline: ZEEKERWETEN (which translates as “knowing for sure/shore”).

Under the watchful eye of experts, citizens learned tricks and tools to make the invisible life visible, at sea, on the beach, in the dunes, and elsewhere along the coast. In doing so, they got the chance to become real citizen scientists.

Staff from LifeWatch Flanders, INBO and VLIZ involved visitors to their stands in hands-on activities regarding plankton and applied artificial intelligence techniques, differentiating alien shell species from native specimens, tracking seagulls, setting up a camera trap, and recognising and reporting on that most invasive of alien species, the Asian hornet.

The open-air event turned out to be fun and fascinating, for young and old, and helped increase scientific knowledge. With more than 90 experts and volunteers involved, nearly 1,200 citizens were brought closer to science, and went home better able to appreciate what fantastic treasures of biodiversity the coastline holds.

The ZEEKERWETEN citizen science festival was an initiative of LifeWatch Belgium.

WoRMS Video Tutorials available on LifeWatch ERIC Training Platform

WoRMS Tutorial

Last year, the WoRMS Data Management Team (DMT), which is supported by LifeWatch Belgium, created instruction videos for the WoRMS editors, to assist them in their online editing activities. Now, the WoRMS DMT has released a series of short tutorial videos specifically aimed at its users, which have also been made available on the LifeWatch ERIC Training Platform.

Are you sometimes a bit at a loss on how you can find species-related information through the WoRMS website? Maybe you are just curious on how you can efficiently search through the available distributions, specimens or literature in WoRMS? Or you want to match your own species list to WoRMS? Well, this series of 6 short tutorial videos – all under 10 minutes – will guide you through all these ‘how to…’ topics:

  • How to search for taxa in WoRMS, through the quick, simple, and advanced search interfaces
  • How to search for literature in WoRMS
  • How to search for distributions in WoRMS
  • How to search for specimens in WoRMS
  • How to upload images and videos through the WoRMS photo gallery (both without and with login)
  • How to match your taxa to WoRMS using the taxon match tool

Click here to access the videos on our Training Platform.

The creation of these tutorial videos fits under the WoRMS endorsed project within the UN Ocean Decade, where WoRMS continues to support not only scientists, but everyone who makes use of species names, including policy, industry and the public at large.

This news item has been adapted from a post on LifeWatch Belgium.

Big Seashell Survey 2022 shows remarkable differences between Belgium and the Netherlands

Big Seashell Survey

On Saturday 19 March 2022, circa 750 citizens collected over 38,000 shells on Belgian beaches for the Big Seashell Survey 2022, with a top-5 in line with the results of the 2021 edition. For the first time, the Netherlands joined this LifeWatch Belgium citizen science initiative and collected another 22,000 shells, showing remarkable differences between the countries.

The Flanders Marine Institute (VLIZ) and its partners (EOS wetenschap, Natuurpunt, Provincie West-Vlaanderen, Strandwerkgroep, Kusterfgoed, the ten coastal municipalities) joined forces for the fifth edition of the Big Seashell Survey, a well-established LifeWatch Belgium citizen science initiative.

On Saturday 19 March, under the bright sunshine, 750 citizens collected, counted and identified 38,000 beach shells, with the help of more than eighty mollusk experts. For the first time, the Netherlands – Naturalis, NMV, Stichting Anemoon, Stichting De Noordzee and the Strandwerkgemeenschap – stepped in and collected another 22,000 shells on seven beaches in the Dutch province of Zuid-Holland and on one Texel beach. In the countries, 60 different species have been registered, with two out of three species shared by Belgium and the Netherlands. Non-indigenous species (NIS) accounted for 10% of all specimens and species.

In addition, scientists discovered remarkable differences between the two countries. Belgium recorded a top-5 comparable to the result of the 2021 edition (Baltic tellin 37%, Cut trough shell 22%, Edible cockle 18%, Blue mussel 9% and Atlantic razor clam 5%), whereas on Dutch beaches there was a clear dominance of Spisula shells, with 49% Cut trough shells, 9% Elliptical trough shells and 6% Thick trough shells. Here, Atlantic razor clams (9%) and the Edible cockle (8%) completed the top-5. One explanation for the high number of Cut trough shells on Dutch beaches could be the slightly different hydrographic conditions with more exposure, in favour of this shell.

“Another difference appears to relate to the vicinity of the Scheldt estuary”, says Jan Seys (VLIZ). “The mouth of this estuary, next to the eastern part of the Belgian coast, contains more silt and clay then the sandier Zuid-Holland and Flemish west coasts, and it has quite some peat banks in and on top of the sea-bottom. This silty environment is perfect for the Baltic tellin; the peat banks can house American and white piddocks”. On the Dutch coast, the Baltic tellin ended up in eighth position, accounting for only 2% of all shells. And in the Netherlands, Barnea candida did not end up in the top-10, whereas piddocks at the eastern part of the Belgian coast were much more common (9% of all shells).”

This news story was originally posted on LifeWatch Belgium.