1. Life Sciences Identifiers Ricardo Pereira TDWG Infrastructure Team (TIP)

2. Data is Available • Many projects exchanging data over the Net

3. From Botanicus.org Existing identifiers • Taxon names • Catalog numbers • Others • Institution Code, Collection Codes

4. Problems to solve • Integrating data Specimens Taxon Name Taxon Observations A computer can’t, because it is all loosely linked by the taxon name. With some effort a scientist who comes along can put all that information together. Publications

5. Data + Terms & Coditions Problems to solve • Giving proper attribution It’s difficult to keep attribution Information with the data Museum A Museum B Reports

6. Problems to solve • Tracking provenance A scientist can tell where a record came from by looking at the collection code It may be awkward for a computer to do it based just on collection codes

7. Solution • Globally Unique Identifiers (GUID) • A scheme to identify and access data objects on the Web. • Identifiers are persistent • They are permanently associated with a data object. • Identifiers are globally unique • Identifiers are actionable or locatable • Provides mechanisms to describe objects: metadata TDWG Architecture Globally Unique Identifiers TDWG Ontology ExchangeProtocols

8. Existing GUID Systems • Life Science Identifiers (LSID) urn:lsid:herbimi.info:specimens:100069 • Handle System 10.1045/january99-bearman • Digital Object Identifiers (DOI) doi:10.1000/182 • Persistent URLs (PURLs) http://purl.oclc.org/OCLC/PURL/FAQ

9. TDWG picked LSIDs • Existing standard for retrieving data and metadata • Decentralised • Easy to assign large numbers of LSIDs • Conceptually distinct from URLs • LSIDs are names not addresses like URLs • Integrates with TDWG architecture • Returns RDF • LSIDs gets you to the data (resolvable)

10. Life Science Identifiers (LSID) urn:lsid:zoobank.org:act:20889795-7EC7-42F3-A4C3-D1D97704A609 A taxon name from ZooBank urn:lsid:herbimi.info:specimens:100069 A fungi specimen from Herb. IMI urn:lsid:ubio.org:classificationbank:1164063 The description of a genus from UBio urn:lsid:gdb.org:GenomicSegment:GDB132938 A segment of the human genome from GDB

11. LSID Resolution Protocol • Well defined way to get data and metadata from an LSID urn:lsid:gdb.org:GenomicSegment:GDB132938 Data Metadata

12. LSIDs at work • Integrating data Specimens Taxon Concept Taxon LSIDs make links unanbiguous. A computer can Integrate all the Information. Observations Publications

13. LSIDs at work • Giving proper attribution Every record has an LSID that can take the user back to attribution information Museum A Museum B Metadata

14. LSIDs at Work • Tracking provenance 2 1 By inspecting the metadata associated with an LSID, a computer can find the original source of a record that has been aggregated

15. Specimens Observations Images Taxon Concepts Taxon Names What gets an LSID • Data objects that- • You serve to your clients • You are an authority for • You have aggregated • Assign new LSIDs • Keep a link to the source • Examples: • Taxon Names • Taxon Concepts • Observations • Specimens • Images

16. What we have done • Support: LSID Website, Proxy & Software • Spec: LSID Applicability Statement • Specifies how our community uses LSIDs • TIP Funded Projects • Deployed LSID Resolvers for Taxon Names • Also a few other data types covered • Development of LSID clients

17. What needs to be done • Ratify TDWG LSID Applicability Statement • Specifies how our community uses LSIDs • Documentation: • LSID Setup Guide • Continue deployment of LSIDs • Increase coverage of other data types: • Specimens, Observations, Organizations, People

18. What can you do? • Respond to the Request for Comments on the LSID Applicability Statement • Follow instructions at www.tdwg.org • Assign LSIDs to your data objects • Lets users refer unambiguously to them • Gives you credit for them • Lets you express attribution (for derived data) • Asserts legal status of data • Information: lsids.sf.net