Abstract
The European Ocean Biogeographic Information System—EurOBIS—is an integrated data system developed by the Flanders Marine Institute (VLIZ) for the EU Network of Excellence “Marine Biodiversity and Ecosystem Functioning” (MarBEF) in 2004. Its principle aims are to centralise the largely scattered biogeographical data on marine species collected by European institutions and to make these quality-controlled data freely available and easily accessible. It is in essence a distributed system in which individual datasets go through a series of quality control procedures before they are integrated into one large consolidated database. EurOBIS is freely available online at www.eurobis.org, where marine biogeographical data—with a focus on taxonomy, temporal and spatial distribution—can be consulted and downloaded for analyses. Over the last 6 years, EurOBIS has collected 228 datasets contributed by more than 75 institutes, representing over 13.6 million distribution records of which almost 12.5 million records are species level identifications. It is now the largest online searchable public source of European marine biological data, holding biogeographical information on 26,801 species and 9,221 genera. EurOBIS acts as the European node of OBIS, the Ocean Biogeographic Information System of the Census of Marine Life (CoML). EurOBIS shares its data with OBIS, which in its turn shares its content with the Global Biodiversity Information Facility (GBIF). This article describes the status of the European Ocean Biogeographic Information System, identifies data gaps, possible applications, uses and limitations. It also formulates a strategy for the growth and improvement of the system and wants to appeal for more contributions.
Similar content being viewed by others
References
Amante, C. & B.W. Eakins, 2009. ETOPO 1 Arc-Minute Global Relief Model: Procedures, Data Sources and Analysis. NOAA Technical Memorandum NESDIS NGDC-24: 19 pp.
Anon., 1953. Limits of Oceans and Seas. 3rd edition. IHO Special Publication, 23. International Hydrographic Organization (IHO), Monaco: 38 pp.
Anon., 2009. Building a European Marine Knowledge Infrastructure: Roadmap for a European Marine Observation and Data Network. Final Commission Staff Working Document 499. Brussel, 7-4-2009; SEC(2009).
Anon., 2010. General Bathymetric Chart of the Oceans (GEBCO): the GEBCO_08 Grid. General Bathymetric Chart of the Oceans: 19 pp.
Appeltans, W., P. Bouchet, G. A. Boxshall, K. Fauchald, D. P. Gordon, B. W. Hoeksema, G. C. B. Poore, R. W. M. van Soest, S. Stöhr, T. C. Walter & M. J. Costello (eds), 2009. World Register of Marine Species. Accessed at http://www.marinespecies.org on 2009-10-05.
Balmford, A. & W. Bond, 2005. Trends in the state of nature and their implications for human well-being. Ecology Letters 8: 1218–1234.
Baum, J. K. & R. A. Myers, 2004. Shifting baselines and the decline of pelagic sharks in the Gulf of Mexico. Ecology Letters 7: 135–145.
Chavan, V., C. T. Achuthankutty, E. Vanden Berghe & M. Wafar, 2005. IndOBIS, an Ocean Biogeographic Information System for assessment and conservation of Indian Ocean Biodiversity. Indian Journal of Marine Sciences 34: 120–127.
Costello, M. & E. Vanden Berghe, 2006. ‘Ocean biodiversity informatics’: a new era in marine biology research and management. Marine Ecology Progress Series 316: 203–214.
Costello, M. J., 2009. Motivating online publication of data. Bioscience 59: 418–427.
Costello, M. J., C. Emblow & R. White, 2001. European Register of Marine Species: a check-list of the marine species in Europe and a bibliography of guides to their identification. Collection Patrimoines Naturels, 50. Muséum national d’Histoire naturelle: Paris, France: 463 pp.
Decker, C. J. & R. O’Dor, 2003. A census of marine life: unknowable or just unknown? Oceanologia Acta 25: 179–186.
Fortibuoni, T., S. Libralato, S. Raicevich, O. Giovanardi & C. Solidoro, 2010. Coding early naturalists’ account into long-term fish community changes in the Adriatic Sea (1800–2000). PLoS ONE 5(11): e15502.
Froese, R., D. Lloris & S. Opitz, 1999. Scientific data in the public domain: the need to make scientific data publicly available—concerns and possible solutions. In Palomares, M. L. D, P. Samb, T. Diouf, J. M. Vakily & D. Pauly (eds), Fish biodiversity: local studies as basis for global inferences, Vol. 14. ACP-EU Fisheries Research Report: 267–271.
Grassle, J. F., 2000. The Ocean Biogeographic Information System (OBIS): an on-line, worldwide atlas for accessing, modelling and mapping marine biological data in a multidimensional geographic context. Oceanography 13: 5–7.
Grassle, J. F. & K. I. Stocks, 1999. A global ocean biogeographic information system (OBIS) for the census of marine life. Oceanography 12: 12–14.
Halpin, P. N., A. J. Read, E. Fujioka, B. D. Best, B. Donnelly, L. J. Hazen, C. Kot, K. Urian, E. LaBrecque, A. Dimattea, J. Cleary, C. Good, L. B. Crowder & K. D. Hyrenbach, 2009. OBIS-SEAMAP: the world data center for marine mammal, sea bird and sea turtle distributions. Oceanography 22: 96–107.
Jackson, J. B. C., M. X. Kirby, W. H. Berger, K. A. Bjorndal, L. W. Botsford, B. J. Bourque, R. H. Bradbury, R. Cooke, J. Erlandson, J. A. Estes, T. P. Hughes, S. Kidwell, C. B. Lange, H. S. Lenihan, J. M. Pandoll, C. H. Peteson, R. S. Steneck, M. J. Tegner & R. R. Warner, 2001. Historical overfishing and the recent collapse of coastal ecosystems. Science 293: 629–637.
Myers, R. A., 2000. The synthesis of dynamic and historical data on marine populations and communities; putting dynamics into the Ocean Biogeographical Information System (OBIS). Oceanography 13: 56–59.
Ojaveer, H., A. Jaanus, B. R. MacKenzie, G. Martin, S. Olenin, T. Radziejewska, I. Telesh, M. L. Zettler & A. Zaiko, 2010. Status of biodiversity in the Baltic Sea. PLoS ONE 5: e12467.
Parr, C. S. & M. P. Cummings, 2005. Data sharing in ecology and evolution. Trends in Ecology and Evolution 20: 362–363.
Pauly, D., 1995. Anecdotes and the shifting baseline syndrome of fisheries. Trends in Ecology and Evolution 10: 430.
Prance, G., 2000. The failure of biogeographers to convey the conservation message. Journal of Biogeography 27: 51–53.
Read, A. J., P. N. Halpin, L. B. Crowder, B. D. Best & E. Fujioka (eds), 2011. OBIS-SEAMAP: mapping marine mammals, birds and turtles. World Wide Web electronic publication. http://seamap.env.duke.edu, Accessed on January 19, 2011.
Thurstan, R. H. & C. M. Roberts, 2010. Ecological meltdown in the Firth of Clyde, Scotland: two centuries of change in a coastal marine ecosystem. PLoS ONE 5: e11767.
Vandepitte, L., J. Vanaverbeke, B. Vanhoorne, F. Hernandez & T. N. Bezerra, 2009. The MANUELA database: an integrated database on meiobenthos from European marine waters. Meiofauna Marina 17: 35–60.
VLIZ, 2010. VLIZ Marine Gazetteer. Available online at http://www.vliz.be/vmdcdata/vlimar/. Consulted on 2010-08-25.
Yarincik, K. & R. O’Dor, 2005. The Census of Marine Life: goals, scope and strategy. Scientia Marina 69: 201–208.
Zeller, D., R. Froese & D. Pauly, 2005. On losing and recovering fisheries and marine science data. Marine Policy 29: 69–73.
Acknowledgments
The EurOBIS data management team would like to thank all scientists, institutes and institutions for making their data available through this portal. EurOBIS has received funding from the MarBEF Network of Excellence ‘Marine Biodiversity and Ecosystem Functioning’ which is carried out by the Sustainable Development, Global Change and Ecosystems Programme of the European Community’s Sixth Framework Programme (contract no. GOCE-CT-2003-505446).
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Additional information
Handling editor: Stuart Jenkins
An erratum to this article can be found at http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s10750-011-0712-6
Electronic supplementary material
Below is the link to the electronic supplementary material.
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Vandepitte, L., Hernandez, F., Claus, S. et al. Analysing the content of the European Ocean Biogeographic Information System (EurOBIS): available data, limitations, prospects and a look at the future. Hydrobiologia 667, 1–14 (2011). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10750-011-0656-x
Received:
Revised:
Accepted:
Published:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10750-011-0656-x