Publication of research results of the AMUNATCOLL project

2022-12-28

Publication of research results of the AMUNATCOLL project

The latest issue of the journal “Biodiversity: Research and Conservation” is devoted entirely to the AMUNATCOLL project. The project “Nature Collections of the Adam Mickiewicz University on the Internet: digitization and making available the resources of biodiversity of the Faculty of Biology at the Adam Mickiewicz University in Poznan”, was implemented in 2018-2021 by a consortium consisting of the Adam Mickiewicz University – Faculty of Biology (project coordinator) and PSNC (technological partner).

The result of the work carried out under the project is more than 2.2 million digitized specimens and hundreds of terabytes of scans and images. The data can be viewed through the developed portal or in the GBIF international database, where they have been exported, representing about one per mille of all information from around the world. In addition, a mobile application has been developed, available for Android and iOS systems, which allows to conduct research in the field and upload the results to the portal, where they can be further processed using advanced BioGIS tools.

In terms of publication, the project resulted in a number of articles, including a special issue 65/2022 of the journal ”Biodiversity: Research and Conservation”, fully dedicated to the AMUNATCOLL project. A total of four articles are published, addressing issues in different areas of the project implementation. The first article deals with the basis of the need for the project, at the heart of which lies the scientific value of the natural history collections gathered at the Faculty of Biology of the Adam Mickiewicz University. These collections are widely used in taxonomic, biogeographical, phylogenetic, ecological and genetic research. In addition, they have significant educational value and serve to disseminate knowledge about biodiversity. The next article focuses on selected aspects of the “life cycle” of a project with particular emphasis on the preparatory phase. The third paper discusses procedures and operational aspects related to the proper storage and handling of taxonomic, biogeographic and ecological data of digitized biological specimens. The last paper deals with interfaces (graphical, programming) for access, exploration and manipulation of the data available in the database.