WoRMS Philanthropy grants 2020
During 2020, the VLIZ Philanthropy program was able to issue four grants to support WoRMS editors, in making WoRMS more complete. Together, these four grants resulted in about 10.000 edits and additions to WoRMS.
The WoRMS Philanthropy grants are one of the philanthropy projects of the Flanders Marine Institute (VLIZ): “Support the WoRMS editors”. Four editors responded to the call, which we launched June last year. All four applications each received 500 Euro to make WoRMS more complete. The editors or their students added missing information with the focus on original names, original descriptions, information related to the type specimen and images.
Débora Cristina Melo da Silva from Brazil added new information for the Nematoda, and this for 400 marine, 800 freshwater and 800 terrestrial species. Under the supervision of taxonomic editor Virág Venekey, Débora added new genera and species, new combinations, missing original names (basionyms), type localities and original descriptions. This resulted in some 4.000 additions and edits to the WoRMS database.
Jan Steger from Austria focused on making available 3.270 images for the Echinoidea. Under the supervision of Andreas Kroh, Jan performed a quality control on and compiled metadata for high quality images from three published monographs about sea urchins by Heinke Schultz. These images are linked to 896 different Echinoida taxa in WoRMS. His work contributes to one of the WoRMS high priorities to have at least one image available in WoRMS for each accepted taxon. These images are not available in WoRMS yet, but will be added in the coming weeks.
We also received help from India. Karthick Balasubramanian checked and revised the status of some 400 Diatom names, with a focus on Diatoms from the Indian subcontinent. For unaccepted names, he also made the link with the accepted name. Furthermore, he updated the type locality and habitat flags for these species. All this is good for 876 additions and edits to the WoRMS database.
Lastly, Livia de Moura Oliveira, also from Brazil, focused on the Didemnidae and Styelidae, two families within the Ascidiacea. Under the supervision of taxonomic editor Rosana Rocha, Livia added missing species names, synonyms, type species, type localities, distributions and original descriptions. Livia made more than 2.100 additions and edits to the WoRMS database.
Together, these four grants are responsible for about 10.000 additions and edits to the database. This brings us again one step closer to a complete World Register of Marine Species.
We also would like to thank all the people who supported the VLIZ Philanthropy project “Support the WoRMS editors”, which results in these fruitful grants.
The grant reports are available online and can be consulted here.
Image credit: Grun, Tobias B.
Débora Cristina Melo da Silva from Brazil added new information for the Nematoda, and this for 400 marine, 800 freshwater and 800 terrestrial species. Under the supervision of taxonomic editor Virág Venekey, Débora added new genera and species, new combinations, missing original names (basionyms), type localities and original descriptions. This resulted in some 4.000 additions and edits to the WoRMS database.
Jan Steger from Austria focused on making available 3.270 images for the Echinoidea. Under the supervision of Andreas Kroh, Jan performed a quality control on and compiled metadata for high quality images from three published monographs about sea urchins by Heinke Schultz. These images are linked to 896 different Echinoida taxa in WoRMS. His work contributes to one of the WoRMS high priorities to have at least one image available in WoRMS for each accepted taxon. These images are not available in WoRMS yet, but will be added in the coming weeks.
We also received help from India. Karthick Balasubramanian checked and revised the status of some 400 Diatom names, with a focus on Diatoms from the Indian subcontinent. For unaccepted names, he also made the link with the accepted name. Furthermore, he updated the type locality and habitat flags for these species. All this is good for 876 additions and edits to the WoRMS database.
Lastly, Livia de Moura Oliveira, also from Brazil, focused on the Didemnidae and Styelidae, two families within the Ascidiacea. Under the supervision of taxonomic editor Rosana Rocha, Livia added missing species names, synonyms, type species, type localities, distributions and original descriptions. Livia made more than 2.100 additions and edits to the WoRMS database.
Together, these four grants are responsible for about 10.000 additions and edits to the database. This brings us again one step closer to a complete World Register of Marine Species.
We also would like to thank all the people who supported the VLIZ Philanthropy project “Support the WoRMS editors”, which results in these fruitful grants.
The grant reports are available online and can be consulted here.
Image credit: Grun, Tobias B.
