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Plants, fungi and algae are important components of global biodiversity and are fundamental to all ecosystems. They are the basis for human well-being, providing food, materials and medicines. Specimens of all three groups of organisms are accommodated in herbaria, where they are commonly referred to as botanical specimens.The large number of specimens in herbaria provides an ample, permanent and continuously improving knowledge base on these organisms and an indispensable source for the analysis of the distribution of species in space and time critical for current and future research relating to global biodiversity. In order to make full use of this resource, a research infrastructure has to be built that grants comprehensive and free access to the information in herbaria and botanical collections in general. This can be achieved through digitization of the botanical objects and associated data.The botanical research community can count on a long-standing tradition of collaboration among institutions and individuals. It agreed on data standards and standard services even before the advent of computerization and information networking, an example being the Index Herbariorum as a global registry of herbaria helping towards the unique identification of specimens cited in the literature.In the spirit of this collaborative history, 51 representatives from 30 institutions advocate to start the digitization of botanical collections with the overall wall-to-wall digitization of the flat objects stored in German herbaria. Germany has 70 herbaria holding almost 23 million specimens according to a national survey carried out in 2019. 87% of these specimens are not yet digitized. Experiences from other countries like France, the Netherlands, Finland, the US and Australia show that herbaria can be comprehensively and cost-efficiently digitized in a relatively short time due to established workflows and protocols for the high-throughput digitization of flat objects.Most of the herbaria are part of a university (34), fewer belong to municipal museums (10) or state museums (8), six herbaria belong to institutions also supported by federal funds such as Leibniz institutes, and four belong to non-governmental organizations. A common data infrastructure must therefore integrate different kinds of institutions.Making full use of the data gained by digitization requires the set-up of a digital infrastructure for storage, archiving, content indexing and networking as well as standardized access for the scientific use of digital objects. A standards-based portfolio of technical components has already been developed and successfully tested by the Biodiversity Informatics Community over the last two decades, comprising among others access protocols, collection databases, portals, tools for semantic enrichment and annotation, international networking, storage and archiving in accordance with international standards. This was achieved through the funding by national and international programs and initiatives, which also paved the road for the German contribution to the Global Biodiversity Information Facility (GBIF).Herbaria constitute a large part of the German botanical collections that also comprise living collections in botanical gardens and seed banks, DNA- and tissue samples, specimens preserved in fluids or on microscope slides and more. Once the herbaria are digitized, these resources can be integrated, adding to the value of the overall research infrastructure. The community has agreed on tasks that are shared between the herbaria, as the German GBIF model already successfully demonstrates.We have compiled nine scientific use cases of immediate societal relevance for an integrated infrastructure of botanical collections. They address accelerated biodiversity discovery and research, biomonitoring and conservation planning, biodiversity modelling, the generation of trait information, automated image recognition by artificial intelligence, automated pathogen detection, contextualization by interlinking objects, enabling provenance research, as well as education, outreach and citizen science.We propose to start this initiative now in order to valorize German botanical collections as a vital part of a worldwide biodiversity data pool.
Video and image data are regularly used in the field of benthic ecology to document biodiversity. However, their use is subject to a number of challenges, principally the identification of taxa within the images without associated physical specimens. The challenge of applying traditional taxonomic keys to the identification of fauna from images has led to the development of personal, group, or institution level reference image catalogues of operational taxonomic units (OTUs) or morphospecies. Lack of standardisation among these reference catalogues has led to problems with observer bias and the inability to combine datasets across studies. In addition, lack of a common reference standard is stifling efforts in the application of artificial intelligence to taxon identification. Using the North Atlantic deep sea as a case study, we propose a database structure to facilitate standardisation of morphospecies image catalogues between research groups and support future use in multiple front-end applications. We also propose a framework for coordination of international efforts to develop reference guides for the identification of marine species from images. The proposed structure maps to the Darwin Core standard to allow integration with existing databases. We suggest a management framework where high-level taxonomic groups are curated by a regional team, consisting of both end users and taxonomic experts. We identify a mechanism by which overall quality of data within a common reference guide could be raised over the next decade. Finally, we discuss the role of a common reference standard in advancing marine ecology and supporting sustainable use of this ecosystem.
A new genus and six new species of the family Gomphodesmidae from the Udzungwa Mts are described, including Pogoro alopias Rosenmejer & Enghoff sp. nov., Pogoro siren Rosenmejer & Enghoff sp. nov., Pogoropsis prolixopes Rosenmejer & Enghoff gen. et sp. nov., Emphysemastix frampt Olsen & Enghoff sp. nov., Agrophogonus hamulus Olsen & Enghoff sp. nov., and Agrophogonus pusillokiellandi Olsen & Enghoff sp. nov. Emphysemastix dracarys Olsen & Enghoff sp. nov. from Iringa city is described. Descriptive notes are given for Pogoro scharffi Hoffman, 2005, and Agrophogonus mwanihana Hoffmann, 2005. General gomphodesmid gonopod morphology is described and illustrated. A key to Udzungwa gomphodesmids is presented, as well as revised keys to all species of Emphysemastix and Agrophogonus. All gomphodesmid species from the Udzungwa Mts are mapped.
Twenty-two new species of the genus Eviulisoma Silvestri, 1910, from the Eastern Arc Mountains, Tanzania, are described: E. acaciae sp. nov., E. aequilobatum sp. nov., E. akkariae sp. nov., E. angulatum sp. nov., E. articulatum sp. nov., E. biquintum sp. nov., E. breviscutum sp. nov., E. cetafi sp. nov., E. chitense sp. nov., E. commelina sp. nov., E. coxale sp. nov., E. ejti sp. nov., E. grumslingslak sp. nov., E. kalimbasiense sp. nov., E. navuncus sp. nov., E. nessiteras sp. nov., E. ottokrausi sp. nov., E. paradisiacum sp. nov., E. sternale sp. nov. and E. zebra sp. nov. from the Udzungwa Mts, E. culter sp. nov. from the Rubeho Mts and E. kangense sp. nov. from the Kanga Mts. Eviulisoma kwabuniense Kraus, 1958, and E. dabagaense Kraus, 1958, both from the Udzungwa Mts, are redesribed based on new material. Notes are provided on E. iuloideum (Verhoeff, 1941) based on type material. Eoseviulisoma Brolemann, 1920, is synonymized under Eviulisoma, based on newly collected material of E. julinum (Attems, 1909), type species of Eoseviulisoma. New material of Suohelisoma ulugurense Hoffman, 1964, type species of Suohelisoma Hoffman, 1964, has revealed that the gonopod structure is more similar to that of Eviulisoma than originally thought, but Suohelisoma is retained as a valid genus. Four species groups are recognized among Eviulisoma species from the Udzungwa Mts, but the need for a revision of the entire genus is emphasized. Two types of epizootic fungi are recorded from Eviulisoma spp., and an enigmatic amorphous mass, which may be a kind of plugging substance, is recorded from the gonopod tips and excavated sixth sternum of several species.
A new genus, Cicatrisphaerion Lingafelter, Morris, Skillman, and Santos-Silva (Coleoptera: Cerambycidae), and three new species of the same authorship, C. wappesi from Quintana Roo, Mexico, C. rileyi from Chiapas, Mexico, and Eupogonius wappesi from Quintana Roo, Mexico, are described. New records and clarification on the distribution of Psyrassaforma janzeni Chemsak, 1991 and P. nitida Chemsak, 1991 are provided. Ameriphoderes amoena (Chemsak and Linsley, 1979) is redescribed based on four male specimens and a new country record from Guatemala is documented. New distributional records are provided for Estola flavobasalis Breuning, 1940 (including a new country record for Bolivia) and Estola vittulata Bates, 1874. A redescription and new distributional record are provided for Eupogonius flavovittatus Breuning, 1940 based on a female specimen.
Klugiatragus gen. nov. is described for Epimelitta laticornis (Klug, 1825) because this species has closed procoxal cavities, a crucial diagnostic incompatible with Epimelitta Bates, 1870, which has open procoxal cavities. Both sexes of this species are illustrated.
Ampharete oculicirrata sp. nov. (Annelida: Ampharetidae) is described from samples collected by the Joint Nature Conservation Committee and Marine Scotland Science, in the West Shetland Shelf NCMPA in the NE Atlantic. This species is characterised by a very small body size, thin and slender paleae, twelve thoracic and eleven abdominal uncinigers, presence of eyes both in the prostomium and the pygidium, the latter provided with a pair of long lateral cirri. The external micro-morphology of the new taxon was studied using scanning electron microscopy and compared with species described or reported from the North Atlantic. Two complementary keys to all species of Ampharete in the area are also provided.