Biodiversity, taxonomy and metagenomics

Virus taxonomy in the age of metagenomics

| The number and diversity of viral sequences that are identified in metagenomic data far exceeds that of experimentally characterized virus isolates. In a recent workshop, a panel of experts discussed the proposal that, with appropriate quality control, viruses that are known only from metagenomic data can, and should be, incorporated into the official classification scheme of the Internationa...

Internet-based Ant Taxonomy and Biodiversity Informatics

A geometric view of Biodiversity: scaling to metagenomics

We have designed a new efficient dimensionality reduction algorithm in order to investigate new ways of accurately characterizing the biodiversity, namely from a geometric point of view, scaling with large environmental sets produced by NGS (∼ 10 sequences). The approach is based on Multidimensional Scaling (MDS) that allows for mapping items on a set of n points into a low dimensional euclidea...

BDEI : Biodiversity Information Organization using Taxonomy ( BIOT )

Biological resources are the basis of much of this Nation’s prosperity. The wise stewardship of these riches affects current and future generations and, therefore, must be rooted in decisions based on the best information available. Because of the rapid growth of all content on the Internet, there is a corresponding increase in online biological information of all types. However, the sheer volu...

The role of taxonomy in conserving biodiversity

No conservationist doubts that taxonomy is an essential tool for understanding biodiversity, as it provides the organising principle for thinking about this vast topic. Thus the reawakening of interest in this scientific discipline is very welcome. Two recent major scientific-technical advances will make taxonomy an even more useful tool for conservation in the coming years. The first advance h...