S4BioDiv 2020

3rd International Workshop on Semantics for Biodiversity

The S4BioDiv 3rd International Workshop on Semantics for Biodiversity, to be held in Bolzano, Italy, on 16 September, has issued a call for papers. Authors are invited to submit for inclusion topics related the application and development of semantic technologies to support research in the biodiversity and related domains. In the light of the coronavirus crisis, the conference may need to be held virtually. The final format of the conference will be determined in June.

Biodiversity deals with heterogeneous data and concepts generated from a large number of disciplines in order to build a coherent picture of the extent of life on earth. The presence of such a myriad of data resources makes integrative biodiversity research increasingly important, as well as challenging given the variety of ways in which data and information are produced and made available. The Semantic Web approach enhances data discoverability, sharing, interoperability and integration through a formalised conceptual environment providing common formats, standards, and terminological resources.

The S4BioDiv 2020 Workshop, which is supported by LifeWatch ERIC, aims to bring together computer scientists and biologists, working on Semantic Web approaches for biodiversity, ecology and related areas such as plant sciences, agronomy, agroecology or citizen science related to biodiversity. The goal is to exchange experiences, build a state of the art of realizations and challenges, and reuse and adapt solutions that have been proposed in other domains. The workshop focuses will be on presenting challenging issues and solutions for the design of high-quality biodiversity information systems leveraging Semantic Web techniques.

Click here for conference details and important dates.

Ten remarkable new marine species from 2019

As in previous years, the World Register of Marine Species (WoRMS) has again released the annual list of the top-ten marine species described by researchers during the year 2019 to coincide with World Taxonomist Appreciation day – 19 March!

Every day in labs, museums, out on fieldwork, taxonomists are busy collecting, cataloguing, identifying, comparing, describing and naming species new to science. Some 500 experts globally also contribute their valuable time to keeping the World Register of Marine Species up to date.

Today is a chance for us at WoRMS to thank all our editors for this important task. And we celebrate the work of taxonomists now with the WoRMS list of the top-ten marine species described in 2019 as nominated and voted for by taxonomists and journal editors!

This top ten list is just a small highlight of almost 2,000 fascinating new marine species discovered every year. Each of these marine animals has a story. This year the chosen species are in some cases particularly small, large, hidden or rather sparkly! We feature the unusual light-producing Christmas-Light Brittle Star and the Star-of-the-Sea Seed Shrimp; the tiny Brenner’s Bobtail Squid; cryptic Boring Amphipods and Green Rat Clingfish; and even a giant Mediterranean Branching Placozoan (well, giant for a placozoan…).

A list of the ‘Top Ten Species’ described from ALL habitats and taxa has been announced annually since 2008 by the State University of New York College of Environmental Science and Forestry (ESF). The oceans cover over 70% of the surface of our planet, and yet they still include the least explored regions. Although the ESF list often contains one or two marine species, we decided to pay homage to the ‘largest habitat on earth’ by producing our own list of the top marine species.

Go to the LifeWatch Belgium press release for details of these ten remarkable new marine species from 2019.

BEeS Conference postponed

BEes

In light of the growing concerns about COVID-19, in consideration of the limitations that various nation states have enforced to contain the pandemic, and in the light of guidance issued by national public health authorities and global health organisations, LifeWatch ERIC has decided to postpone the Biodiversity and Ecosystem e-Science (BEes) Conference, previously announced for 27-29 May 2020, in Ljubljana.

Given the current circumstances, we have concluded that it is no longer possible to plan and manage our conference to the usual standards in such a way as would sufficiently ensure the safety of participants.

We thank all our prospective participants for their trust and interest, but we issue this urgent warning NOT to make any travel or accommodation arrangements for this event.

Now is the time for us to put all our strengths together to fight this pandemic. New dates and details will be communicated as soon as possible.

Workshop: Online Bioinformatic Platforms to support Metabarcoding and Metagenomics research and Applications

The pan-European Workshop, held in Porto from 26 – 28 February, in the Research Centre in Biodiversity and Genetic Resources (CIBIO-InBIO) at the Vairão campus of the University of Porto, Portugal, boasted a very specific title: ‘Online Bioinformatic Platforms to Support Metabarcoding and Metagenomics Research and Applications’.

The workshop witnessed more than 30 participants from nine European countries (Belgium, Estonia, Germany, Greece, Italy, Norway, Portugal, Slovenia, Spain, Switzerland) with different expertise and backgrounds, ranging from metagenomics and metabarcoding, to ecology and ICT.

1) Checking existing distributed Bioinformatics e-Resources within the LifeWatch ERIC communities of practice,

2) Reaching a common understanding of users’ requirements and needs in Virtual Research Environments, and

3) Proposing an efficient and realistic and engaging mechanism from an ICT perspective, capable of federating those e-Resources within the LifeWatch ERIC VREs.

Examples of evidence-based research were provided by the European Open Science Cloud (EOSC), MIRRI (Microbial Research Resource Infrastructure), ELIXIR (which unites Europe’s leading life science organisations in managing and safeguarding the ever-growing volumes of data generated), other Research Infrastructures and Bioinformatics initiatives.

The outcome of the three days was a plan with well-identified next steps towards the co-construction of the bioinformatic platform.

Transfiere 2020

Transfiere 2020

Transfiere is the biggest professional and multi-sectoral forum for knowledge and technology transfer to take place in Spain. On 12-13 February, the Palace of Fairs and Congress in Málaga FYCMA witnessed the gathering of the most relevant players in the national and international Research & Development & Innovation ecosystem, at Transfiere 2020.

Being part of Transfiere 2020 allowed the 1,600 participants to build networks of contacts, synergies and knowledge sharing in fields as diverse as Artificial intelligence and digital transformation, Public Administration, Internationalisation opportunities, and Investment and Open innovation. 

At the LifeWatch ERIC stand, Giovanna Caputi, National Nodes Operations Manager, and Cristina Huertas-Olivares, International Initiatives and Projects Manager, interacted with delegates and disseminated information on the Infrastructure’s potential to facilitate interdisciplinary research in biodiversity and ecosystems.  

In parallel, working meetings were held on new Workflows & VRE developments at the University of Málaga-Picasso HPC, part of LifeWatch ERIC ICT-Core premises. Their coordinator, LifeWatch ERIC CTO Juan Miguel González-Aranda welcomed participants from LW ERIC international ICT Team, and introduced Professors Emilio López Zapata & José F. Aldana also considered reputed experts on HPC, Big Data & Artificial Intelligence at international level, who supported at technical level during the different sessions.

Felipe Romera, president of the Organising Committee of Transfiere 2020, was pleased that the two days of “much intensity” had provided a valuable meeting place for the Spanish innovation system and strategic sectors of the economy, both public and private.

You can read about Transfiere 2021 here.

Collaboration opportunities in the Arctic

LifeWatch ERIC participated in the second Board Meeting of the Conservation of Arctic Flora and Fauna (CAFF) at the invitation of the Swedish CAFF Chairmanship. The meeting, held on February 3-6, 2020 at the Gällivare Folkets Hus in Sweden, was attended by the LifeWatch ERIC e-infrastructure operation coordinator, Antonio José Sáenz-Albanés. 

CAFF is the biodiversity working group of the Arctic Council, established in 1996 as a high-level governmental forum to address issues faced by the Arctic governments and the indigenous people of the Arctic. LifeWatch ERIC is involved in the CAFF Arctic Migratory Birds Initiative (AMBI).

LifeWatch ERIC supports AMBI in many ways, hosting in its Spanish premises the offices of the Coordinator of the African Eurasian Flyway, which seeks to improve the conservation and management of shorebird sites along their migration paths from the Arctic down to Africa, and supporting AMBI objectives and its engagement within the African continent and in particular in Guinea-Bissau.

As the Board Meeting progressed however, it became clear that Arctic ecosystems are facing challenges that LifeWatch ERIC is already addressing elsewhere, such as Arctic Invasive Alien Species for example, thus opening up further possibilities to collaborate and add value to a wide range of issues.

In this context, when Antonio José Sáenz-Albanés gave a presentation on LifeWatch ERIC’s state-of-art of ICT developments in Data FAIRness and workflows, some still under construction and deployment, and commitments to dealing with environmental hot topics, it was warmly welcomed. 

The last day provided the opportunity to learn first-hand about the application of indigenous knowledge in managing biodiversity and ecosystem services by the Sámi people, also known as Saami or Lapps, who are native to northern parts of Norway, Sweden, Finland and the Kola peninsula of Russia.

LifeWatch ERIC Seminar to MSc Students

Training and education are among the core objectives of LifeWatch ERIC; the research infrastructure not only offers online learning opportunities thanks to its online platform and ICT tools, but also face-to-face courses and seminars to directly engage with academics, in particular University Students and early career researchers.

On 13 and 14 January 2020, LifeWatch ERIC Chief Executive Officer, Christos Arvanitidis, is in Thessaloniki and Crete giving, on behalf of the whole Executive Board of the infrastructure, a seminar addressed to master students on how LifeWatch ERIC, as a research infrastructure, can contribute to the study and conservation of transitional ecosystems.

European Researchers’ Night

September is a busy month in the LifeWatch ERIC calendar, not only for the many scientific congresses, but also because of the increased outreach to the general public, students and families in particular, to interest them in the science behind biodiversity and ecosystem research. Within the framework of the European Researchers’ Night, on 27 September 2019, events were staged in member countries to highlight the impact of research on our daily lives.

As a record 7.6 million people took to the streets in Climate Strike protests around the world, universities, laboratories and museums across Europe were opening their doors to promote how scientific researchers contribute to society by displaying their work in interactive and engaging ways, with the ultimate aim of motivating young people to embark on research careers of their own. 

The LifeWatch Greece team participated in a European Researchers’ Night in the Hellenic Centre for Marine Research, Heraklion. Hundreds of people attended and had the opportunity to learn about marine research and aquatic biodiversity in different thematic pavilions and hands-on activities, including Virtual Reality, interactive games and demonstrations.

In Lecce, Italy, professors Alberto Basset (LifeWatch ERIC) and Giuseppe Corriero (LifeWatch Italy) joined “A Pint with Science”, an open event in a popular bar, talking about ‘Biodiversity Emergency, Objective Sustainability’ to a responsive crowd of followers on Thursday. 

The following day, LifeWatch ERIC Service Centre at the University of Salento opened its premises to young people and families, to play dedicated serious games on biodiversity and make enquiries about the infrastructure and its activities. Listening to videos of key scientists explaining how ecological science builds an understanding of the issues we face globally, visitors were guided to learn more about the key challenges ahead in the field of biodiversity and ecosystem research 

In the midst of popular calls to deal with current climate issues, these outreach events showcase the diversity of research, bring researchers closer to the public, mobilise citizens, and increase general awareness and understanding of how important research and innovation are in addressing societal challenges.

International Summer School on “Data Management in Environmental and Earth Science Infrastructures”

Between 9 – 13 July, around 40 academics, researchers, PhD students, data managers and research infrastructure developers from all across Europe gathered in Lecce, to join the International Summer School on “Data Management in Environmental and Earth Science Infrastructures: theory and practice”, organised by the H2020 ENVRIplus project and the LifeWatch ERIC Service Centre.

In recent years, one of the major challenges in environmental and earth science has been managing and using continuously growing volumes of data collected across multiple disciplines, and educating both scientists and developers on how best to do so. Many different standards, approaches, and tools have now been developed to support the research data lifecycle, which need to be examined and, where appropriate, adopted by a wider community. In particular, modern semantic technologies provide a promising way to properly describe and interrelate different data sources in ways that reduce barriers to data discovery, integration, and exchange among environmental and ecological resources and the researchers who use them.

To address these challenges, ENVRIplus and the LifeWatch ERIC Service Centre organised a five-day summer school providing an unique insight into the contemporary debate on data management in the environmental and earth sciences. The programme, combining theory with hands-on sessions, explored themes as diverse as reference modelling and research metadata semantics, data processing and e-infrastructure, identification and citation, cataloguing and provenance, and closed presenting two use cases on data management in the context of LifeWatch Italy.

2018 International Summer School on “Data Management in Environmental and Earth Science Infrastructures”

Between the 9 –13 July, around 40 academics, researchers, PhD students, data managers and research infrastructure developers coming from all across Europe gathered in Lecce, to join the International Summer School on “Data Management in Environmental and Earth Science Infrastructures: theory and practice”, organised by the H2020 ENVRIplus and LifeWatch Service Centre.

In recent years, one of the major challenges in environmental and earth science has been managing and using continuously growing volumes of data collected across multiple disciplines, and educating both scientists and developers on how best to do so. Many different standards, approaches, and tools have now been developed to support the research data lifecycle, which need to be examined and, where appropriate, adopted by a wider community. In particular, modern semantic technologies provide a promising way to properly describe and interrelate different data sources in ways that reduce barriers to data discovery, integration, and exchange among environmental and ecological resources and the researchers who use them.

To address these challenges, ENVRIplus and the LifeWatch Service Centre organised a five-day summer school providing an unique insight into the contemporary debate on data management in the environmental and earth sciences. The programme, combining theory with hands-on sessions, explored themes as diverse as reference modelling and research metadata semantics, data processing and e-infrastructure, identification and citation, cataloguing and provenance, and closed presenting two use cases on data management in the context of LifeWatch Italy.

“Both ENVRIplus and the LifeWatch Service Centre have been working on these topics and have already organised dedicated workshops and training sessions in recent years.” say the organisers, Nicola Fiore (LifeWatch Service Centre) and Zhiming Zhao (ENVRIplus). “This year we decided to move forward and propose a full International Summer School; its participants were enthusiastic about the programme and so we are already at work on a 2019 edition”.