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Indian ocean
and its biodiversity is a major thrust area for countries
bordering Indian Ocean for the developmental process. On this
context the questions that need to be addressed start from
basic questions like how many species are present in the
region? What are they? What are their habitats? Are they
useful or not? How many of them are threatened ones, etc. We
also need to have answers for questions like, what will be the
condition of corals reefs or mangroves after fifty years? What
will be the status of marine turtles of Indian coast after 10
years? What was the status 20 year back?. Etc. These questions
can only be answered with databases that have scientifically
and systematically collated information from basic research.
But what we know of the components of coastal and marine
biodiversity or changes over time are highly scattered and are
not often readily accessible to all. Although much research
has been carried out, or is currently going on, many
initiatives are unrelated, data are difficult to trace and
even more difficult to integrate. What is available is often
in non-interoperable formats, compounded by uncertain
taxonomic identities that underscore the need for a scientific
information system that enables to transfer marine
biodiversity information.
In the last two decades, study of the sea has leaped forward
with the advancement in science and technology, improved
sensors to observe the sea by direct measurements as well as
remotely from space, and in particular with the progress in
information technology. Remotely sensed and in situ
observations are increasingly being made available through the
Global Ocean Observing System (GOOS), creating an
unprecedented amount of geo-referenced environmental and
ecosystem data. Computer and communications capabilities
permit rapid assembly, and meaningful analysis of immense
volumes of diverse data. Moreover, earth and life scientists
have developed highly capable systems for planning,
coordinating, and executing coherent and effective programs on
a global scale.
Understanding the biodiversity in the context of global
warming, biological invasion, IPR, etc. are need of the time.
We need tools that are handy for formulating ecologically
sound policies. It is heartening to see that in the recent
time, some global initiatives have started for helping all the
spectrum of people. Global initiatives are grouped mainly into
two main categories viz.(a) Taxonomic databases readily
available are Integrated Taxonomic Information System (IT IS),
Species 2000, ETI bioinformatics, Animaldiversity Web,
Taxonomic database working Group, etc. Some taxon specific
databases are also available like Fishbase, Cephbase, Reefbase,
and Algaebase. The main objectives of these databases are to
create an easily accessible databse with reliable information
on species name and their hierarchical classification. The IT
IS includes documented taxonomic information of flora and
fauna from both aquatic and terrestrial habitats. The goal of
the species 2000 project is to create a validated checklist of
all the world’s species.
In a group of georeferenced biological databases, Global
Biodiversity Information Facility (GBIF) needs a special
mention. It has 179 data providers and more than 100 millions
records on it. It uses distributed computing platform
specially developed for biological data transfer. It gives
biological data of marine as well as land organisms. The
special technologies developed for that includes DiGIR server,
BioCASE, DarwinCore, etc. The geographically referenced data
is useful for further scientific analysis. Some of the tools
available for scientific analysis include Desktop GARP,
BIOmapper, etc. The new technologies like Mobile computing,
Distributed computing, Grid computing, neural networks, W3
consortium, etc. give immense scope for these georeferenced
databases for further expansion. We have already distributed
computing platform like ENVIS (Environmental Information
System) and BTIS (Biotechnology Information System Network). |
