Baylor Scheierman recorded Creighton's first triple-double since 1985, Trey Alexander made his first five 3-pointers and finished with 26 points, and the 17th-ranked Bluejays rolled past Georgetown 94-72 Tuesday night.

Horse racing history of all kinds is being made Saturday in the final Triple Crown race of the year.

China's coast guard this week took the most aggressive action to date against Philippine supply boats attempting to provide goods to a grounded navy vessel at Second Thomas Shoal in the South China Sea.

American diplomatic efforts to conduct people-to-people contacts and exchanges in China are being blocked by Chinese intelligence and security services.

Kevin Rudd, the Australian ambassador to the United States, wants to know who is criticizing him over his views of China.

Five D.C. United fan groups said Monday they'll remain quiet for the first four matches this season to protest the Major League Soccer team's partnership with Saudi Arabia.

Dutch Prime Minister Dick Schoof on Saturday canceled a trip to United Nations climate talks in Azerbaijan so that he can stay in the Netherlands to deal with the fallout from assaults on fans of Maccabi Tel Aviv soccer team in Amsterdam that authorities condemned as antisemitic.

Alexander Zverev advanced to the semifinals of the Paris Masters by beating Stefanos Tsitsipas 7-5, 6-4 on Friday and knocking the Greek player out of contention for the ATP Finals.

Titanium Monthly Membershp

Price: $1,296.00

Description: To receive Gold, Gold Plus, Diamond, or Titanium membership you must first apply and be accepted to the program and then purchase the 'Home Study System' for 3 payments of $499 USD (30 days apart). With your Home Study System you receive 3 free months of Gold Membership. *Do not purchase any MASS products without first applying to become a member at:?https://www.musicacademysuccess.com/apply/
If you purchase memberships without having your application approved, you will not be allowed to join the program.

Required For Titanium Membership: Must gross at least $25,000 USD per month to apply.

?

• All the benefits of Gold AND Gold Plus AND Diamond membership (listed below) PLUS:
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• Elite Closed / Private Titanium Facebook Group with DIRECT answers to some questions from Marty (not his staff).
• Two 911 Fifteen minute calls with Marty every year.

MASS Diamond Monthly Membership

Price: $399.00

Description: To receive Gold, Gold Plus, Diamond, or Titanium membership you must first apply and be accepted to the program and then purchase the 'Home Study System' for 3 payments of $499 USD (30 days apart). With your Home Study System you receive 3 free months of Gold Membership. *Do not purchase any MASS products without first applying to become a member at:?https://www.musicacademysuccess.com/apply/
If you purchase memberships without having your application approved, you will not be allowed to join the program.

Diamond monthly coaching members receive:

DIAMOND MEMBERSHIP (Includes all Gold and Gold Plus level benefits also, listed below)

A. Live monthly Gold and bi-monthly Gold Plus member group coaching call where you can ask me questions about your business.

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D. The MASS Resource Directory. Full of important info for Academy owners.

E. Special MASS members only monthly newsletter and special reports mailed to your home.

F. Chance to compete in the MASS School of the Year contest and win $1,000 in cash and a full day consultation visit with Marty Fort.

G. Members only Facebook page.

H.?Unlimited MP3 downloads of the Gold and Gold Plus audio archive, including Office Staff Training calls.

I. Block out seven of your most hated competitors.

J. Get an even more reduced rate for annual conference registrations.

K.? Monthly Office Staff Training call where you and your staff can ask questions of Marty Fort and his office staff.

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M.? Closed Diamond Facebook page just for Diamond members to discuss advanced topics.

N.? Wholesale printing and shipping pricing of the MASS manuals as they are updated for as long as you are a current member.

The MASS Gold, Gold +, Diamond & Titanium membership fees are non refundable.

Gold Plus Monthly Membership

Price: $198.00

Description: To receive Gold, Gold Plus, Diamond, or Titanium membership you must first apply and be accepted to the program and then purchase the 'Home Study System' for 3 payments of $499 USD (30 days apart). With your Home Study System you receive 3 free months of Gold Membership. *Do not purchase any MASS products without first applying to become a member at:?https://www.musicacademysuccess.com/apply/
If you purchase memberships without having your application approved, you will not be allowed to join the program.

Gold + monthly coaching members receive:

GOLD + MEMBERSHIP (Includes all Gold level benefits also, listed below)

A. Live monthly Gold and bi-monthly Gold Plus member group coaching call where you can ask me questions about your business.

B. Audio archive of our monthly Q&A calls

C. CDs of the call of the month.

D. The MASS Resource Directory. Full of important info for Academy owners.

E. Special MASS members only monthly newsletter and special reports mailed to your home.

F. Chance to compete in the MASS School of the Year contest and win $1,000 in cash and a full day consultation visit with Marty Fort.

G. Members only Facebook page.

H.?Unlimited MP3 downloads of the Gold and Gold Plus audio archive, including Office Staff Training calls.

I. Block out four of your most hated competitors.

J. Get a reduced rate for annual conference registrations.

K.? Monthly Office Staff Training call where you and your staff can ask questions of Marty Fort and his office staff.

L.??Wholesale printing and shipping pricing of the MASS manuals as they are updated for as long as you are a current member.

The MASS Gold, Gold +, Diamond & Titanium membership fees are non refundable.

Gold Monthly Membership

Price: $99.00

To receive Gold, Gold +, Diamond, or Titanium membership you must first apply and be accepted to the program and then purchase the 'Home Study System' for 3 payments of $499 USD (30 days apart). With your Home Study System you receive 3 free months of Gold Membership. *Do not purchase any MASS products without first applying to become a member at:?https://www.musicacademysuccess.com/apply/
If you purchase memberships without having your application approved, you will not be allowed to join the program.

Gold monthly coaching members receive:

GOLD MEMBERSHIP

A. Live monthly Gold, Gold Plus, Diamond and Titanium member call where you can ask me questions about your business.

B. Audio archive of our monthly Q&A calls

C. CDs of the call of the month.

D. The MASS resource directory. Full of important info for Academy owners.

E. Special MASS members only monthly newsletter and special reports mailed to your home.

F. Chance to compete in the MASS School of the Year contest and win $1,000 in cash and a full day consultation visit with Marty Fort.

G. Members only Facebook page where you can network with fellow members in a safe, non-selling environment.

H.??Wholesale printing and shipping pricing of the MASS manuals as they are updated for as long as you are a current member.

The MASS Gold, Gold +, Diamond & Titanium membership fees are non refundable.

House Speaker Mike Johnson, hobbled by a one-vote majority and dogged by a small band of disgruntled archconservatives who want to fire him, is determined to defy his critics and remain speaker in the next Congress.

Taiwan's top diplomat in the United States tells The Washington Times in an exclusive interview that China's communist government is intensifying its campaign to pressure countries not to recognize the legitimacy of the island democracy and to block it from participating in the United Nations and other key international organizations.

Last season marked the first time Maryland posted a .500 or better mark in the month of November under Mike Locksley. College football's final month has always been a gauntlet for Locksley's teams, a trend that continues Saturday at No. 1 Oregon.

The new Big Ten truly comes to full bore for Maryland this weekend with its first-ever West Coast conference trip to No. 1 Oregon, bringing with it a host of logistical tweaks and challenges.

Carlos Sainz Jr. won the Mexico City Grand Prix on Sunday and Lando Norris closed the gap in the Formula 1 championship race after another contentious battle with Max Verstappen.

Roger Penske already won two sports car championships this season and heads to Phoenix Raceway with two chances to win a third consecutive NASCAR Cup Series title with both Joey Logano and Ryan Blaney in the winner-take-all season finale.

Drama continued to encompass NASCAR ahead of its championship-deciding season finale as the sanctioning body issued $600,000 in fines and suspended nine team members from three different teams on Tuesday for alleged race manipulation at Martinsville Speedway.

All four NASCAR Xfinity championship drivers said the right things heading into the season finale.

There is no such a thing as a perfect season. At least that is what Roger Penske told The Associated Press hours after winning his third consecutive NASCAR championship.

President-elect Donald Trump's top allies are working to thwart either Sen. John Thune or Sen. John Cornyn from becoming the next majority leader and are pushing for Trump stalwart Rick Scott of Florida to win the post.

The hard-left billionaire George Soros and his heir apparent son Alex have championed, with donations, defunding the police movement, open borders and soft prosecutors.

President-elect Donald Trump isn't messing around. His first major policy statement since his landslide victory outlines his plan to restore free speech.

Will Venable is a busy man these days. The new manager of the Chicago White Sox is learning his way around the organization. He is talking to his new players and working with the front office on its offseason plans.

Online Christian virtual worship services, with streaming music, Bible teaching, searchable Bible...even an offering. Visit this weekly worship service any time, 24/7.

Christian Dating-vs-Courtship compares both practices with Scripture and comes to a rather surprising conclusion. At least surprising for those who don't read the Bible for themselves.

Listen online to streaming Christian praise and worship music for kids. Great to lead your younger children in worship or for older children to lead themselves.

Denver Nuggets power forward Aaron Gordon is expected to miss multiple weeks with a strained right calf, two people familiar with the injury told The Associated Press.

In his first visit back to Utah since awarding Salt Lake City the 2034 Winter Games, the International Olympic Committee president sought to ease worries that the city could lose its second Olympics if organizers don't fulfill an agreement to play peacemaker between anti-doping authorities.

American figure skater Ilia Malinin has been doing gymnastics off the ice much of his life, one of the many reasons why he can so effortlessly land the dazzling quadruple jumps that made him a world champion at just 19 years old last March.

If you are looking for an outer-space romp, here are five recommendations for your next sci-fi binge!

The post Five Ship-Based Shows You Should Watch first appeared on SciFi Stream.

The European Commission adopted a new strategy for encouraging the use of green infrastructure, and for ensuring that the enhancement of natural processes becomes a systematic part of spatial planning. Green Infrastructure is a tried and tested tool that uses nature to provide ecological, economic and social benefits. Instead of building flood protection infrastructure, for example, a green infrastructure solution would be to allow a natural wetland to absorb the excess water from heavy rain.

Green infrastructure is often cheaper and more durable than alternatives provided through conventional civil engineering. Biodiversity-rich parks, green spaces and fresh air corridors can for example mitigate the negative effects of summer heat waves. In addition to the health and environmental benefits, green infrastructure also brings multiple social benefits: it creates jobs and makes cities more appealing places to live and work. And it allows for wildlife to thrive, even in an urban context.

Environment Commissioner Janez Potočnik said: "Building green infrastructure is often a good investment for nature, for the economy and for jobs. We should provide society with solutions that work with nature instead of against it, where that makes economic and environmental sense."

More about the EC Green Infrastructure here: http://ec.europa.eu/environment/nature/ecosystems/index_en.htm

From 16^th to the 18^th of July, a European stakeholder consultation for the Intergovernmental Platform on Biodiversity & Ecosystem Services (IPBES) took place in Leipzig (Germany). The consultation was organized by three European Biodiversity Platforms: Network-Forum Biodiversity Research Germany (NeFo), the Belgian Biodiversity Platform, and the French Foundation for Research on Biodiversity (FRB) (further information on the conference: www.biodiversity.de/index.php/de/ipbes/nefo-aktivitaeten-zu-ipbes/workshops/pan-european-stakeholder-consultation).

IPBES will greatly influence future biodiversity policy and research, and EU BON is expected to provide a European contribution to IPBES. IPBES will be in particular of high interest, because it will need tools to integrate and analyse different data sources, to develop relevant infrastructure and to do assessments of state and trends of biodiversity at multiple scales.

EU BON was represented by several partners at the meeting and we acted as facilitators in the round-tables, gathered input for the project, participated in discussions and exchanged ideas with many representatives and colleagues. We provide you with a short summary of the meeting below.

The aims of the pan-European stakeholder consultation meeting in Leipzig were:

1. To reach out to stakeholders to inform people and institutes and to raise awareness of the dynamics in IPBES.
2. To discuss and obtain feedback on several IPBES-related documents that are currently being drafted. In their final form these documents will be submitted to the Panel for the IPBES 2 plenary session in 9-14 December 2013.

The meeting in Leipzig was organized around round table discussions of several draft documents of importance for stakeholders: the draft work programme, the stakeholder engagement strategy draft and the draft "Vision for pan-European IPBES support perspective". If you are interested these documents, currently for review, can be found here:  http://www.ipbes.net/intersessional-process/current-review-documents-ipbes2.html .

There were several opportunities for EU BON partners to flag the potential biodiversity data and analysis requirements for the future IPBES work program in separate discussions and to give recommendations as to what should be additionally integrated in the draft work programme.

We also brainstormed on a potential EU BON side event at the second IPBES meeting, which will be held in 9-14 December in Antalya, Turkey. Topics discussed by national delegates in that plenary will amongst other topics comprise: the first work programme, budget, stakeholder engagement, the position of observers, technical requirements and a list of thematic priorities for IPBES assessments.

Although the meeting was a success in terms of the number and diversity of participants, the consultation felt for many participants as a top down exercise. However, the importance of being involved at this stage was felt and the hope for stakeholder empowerment in the future was often voiced.

The Royal Museum for Central Africa (RMCA) in Tervuren (Belgium) is part of the FishBase Consortium and responsible for the information on the fresh- and brackish water fishes of Africa. Through an agreement with the Belgian Development Cooperation and as part of the FishBase programme, the RMCA has five grants available for a 3-month training programme in the use of FishBase and the taxonomy of African fishes.

The training includes three subsets:

1. A detailed explanation of FishBase in all its aspects;
2. A training in the taxonomy of African fishes; and
3. A case study based on data from FishBase or on taxa for which taxonomic problems have been encountered.

The main focus of the training is on fish biodiversity data and their integration into FishBase, and on how to use and contribute data to FishBase. The context of these contributions may vary and can also include the knowledge on common names, fish ecology, fisheries statistics, aquaculture and many other areas of fish biology.

After the training, the participants should be able to make their own contribution to fish biology and continue to work on FishBase. They are encouraged to teach their newly apprehended skills to new/local users, to help in completing the database and keeping it up to date, and to spread the use of FishBase as a source of information and a fisheries tool.

This course has been offered annually since 2005 and is held at the Royal Museum for Central Africa (Leuvensesteenweg 13, B-3080 Tervuren, Belgium).

To apply for traineeship and for more information, go to:
http://www.africamuseum.be/research/collaborations/training/group?set_language=en&cl=en

Please note that for 2014, this course will be given in French only.

Contact: Dimitri Geelhand de Merxem (dimitri.geelhand@africamuseum.be)

Taxonomic descriptions, introduced by Linnaeus in 1735, are designed to allow scientists to tell one species from another. Now there is a new futuristic method for describing new species that goes far beyond the tradition. The new approach combines several techniques, including next generation molecular methods, barcoding, and novel computing and imaging technologies, that will test the model for big data collection, storage and management in biology. The study has just been published in the Biodiversity Data Journal.

While 13,494 new animal species were discovered by taxonomists in 2012, animal diversity on the planet continues to decline with unprecedented speed. Concerned with the rapid disappearance rates scientists have been forced towards a so called 'turbo taxonomy' approach, where rapid species description is needed to manage conservation.

While acknowledging the necessity of fast descriptions, the authors of the new study present the other 'extreme' for taxonomic description: "a new species of the future". An international team of scientists from Bulgaria, Croatia, China, UK, Denmark, France, Italy, Greece and Germany illustrated a holistic approach to the description of the new cave dwelling centipede species Eupolybothrus cavernicolus, recently discovered in a remote karst region of Croatia. The project was a collaboration between GigaScience, China National GeneBank, BGI-Shenzhen and Pensoft Publishers.

Eupolybothrus cavernicolus has become the first eukaryotic species for which, in addition to the traditional morphological description, scientists have provided a transcriptomic profile, DNA barcoding data, detailed anatomical X-ray microtomography (micro-CT), and a movie of the living specimen to document important traits of its behaviour. By employing micro-CT scanning in a new species, for the first time a high-resolution morphological and anatomical dataset is created - the 'cybertype' giving everyone virtual access to the specimen.

This, most data-rich species description, represents also the first biodiversity project that joins the ISA (Investigation-Study-Assay) Commons, that is an approach created by the genomic and molecular biology communities to store and describe different data types collected in the course of a multidisciplinary study.

"Communicating the results of next generation sequencing effectively requires the next generation of data publishing" says Prof. Lyubomir Penev, Managing director of Pensoft Publishers. "It is not sufficient just to collect 'big' data. The real challenge comes at the point when data should be managed, stored, handled, peer-reviewed, published and distributed in a way that allows for re-use in the coming big data world", concluded Prof. Penev.

"Next generation sequencing is moving beyond piecing together a species genetic blueprint to areas such as biodiversity research, with mass collections of species in "metabarcoding" surveys bringing genomics, monitoring of ecosystems and species-discovery closer together. This example attempts to integrate data from these different sources, and through curation in BGI and GigaScience's GigaDB database to make it interoperable and much more usable," says Dr Scott Edmunds from BGI and Executive Editor of GigaScience.

Additional information:

Pensoft and the Natural History Museum London have received financial support by the EU FP7 projects ViBRANT and pro-iBiosphere. The China National GeneBank (CNGB) and GigaScience teams have received support from the BGI. The DNA barcodes were obtained through the International Barcode of Life Project supported by grants from NSERC and from the government of Canada through Genome Canada and the Ontario Genomics Institute.

Original Sources:

Stoev P, Komerički A, Akkari N, Shanlin Liu, Xin Zhou, Weigand AM, Hostens J, Hunter CI, Edmunds SC, Porco D, Zapparoli M, Georgiev T, Mietchen D, Roberts D, Faulwetter S, Smith V, Penev L (2013) Eupolybothrus cavernicolus Komerički & Stoev sp. n. (Chilopoda: Lithobiomorpha: Lithobiidae): the first eukaryotic species description combining transcriptomic, DNA barcoding and micro-CT imaging data. Biodiversity Data Journal 1: e1013. DOI: 10.3897/BDJ.1.e1013

Edmunds SC, Hunter CI, Smith V, Stoev P, Penev L (2013) Biodiversity research in the "big data" era: GigaScience and Pensoft work together to publish the most data-rich species description. GigaScience 2:14 doi:10.1186/2047-217X-2-14

Watch the 3D cybertype video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vqPuwKG8hE4&feature=em-upload_owner

Pollination and Land Degradation: Set as top Priorities for New Intergovernmental Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES) after the plenary

IPBES was established in April 2012, as an independent intergovernmental body open to all member countries of the United Nations. The members are committed to building IPBES as the leading intergovernmental body for assessing the state of the planet's biodiversity, its ecosystems, and the essential services they provide to society.

The second meeting of the Platform's Plenary (IPBES-2) took place in Antalya, Turkey, from 9 to 14 December 2013. Around 400 delegates from over 100 governments, scientific organizations, civil society and the private sector, attended the plenary. It was agreed to develop a set of assessments on pollination and food production, land degradation and invasive species aimed at providing policymakers with the tools to tackle pressing environmental challenges.

IPBES Member Governments present at the meeting adopted a very ambitious initial work programme for the Platform for the next five years, and demonstrated strong commitment to its implementation by already pledging more than half (US$ 25.4 million) of the total US$ 43.5 million required, in what will be remembered as the "Antalya consensus".

EU BON was represented by the project coordinator Christoph Häuser (Museum für Naturkunde, MfN), and colleagues Tim Hirsch (Danish Biodiversity information Facility, DanBIF), Dirk Schmeller (Helmholtz Centre for Environmental Research, UFZ), Wolfgang Cramer and Ilse Geijzendorffer (National Center for Scientific Research, CNRS), Matthew Walpole (World Conservation Monitoring Centre, UNEP) and Lluís Brotons (European Bird Census Council, EBCC).

EU BON group photo from left to right: Tim Hirsch (DanBIF), Christoph Häuser (MfN), Matthew Walpole (UNEP), Ilse Geijzendorffer (CNRS), Dirk Schmeller (UFZ), Wolfgang Cramer (CNRS) and Lucas Joppa (Microsoft Reseach). Photo: Dirk Schmeller

Here are their views and comments on the meeting:

1) How can EU BON contribute to the success of IPBES?

Matthew Walpole: Knowledge generation is a key pillar of IPBES. Mobilising data and information on biodiversity and ecosystem services is an important element of knowledge generation, and will be vital in underpinning rigorous, comprehensive assessments. In that regard, and in particular in the context of potential European regional assessments, EU BON as an integral part of GEO BON has a clear contribution to make.

Dirk S. Schmeller: IPBES assessments will base on available data and newly collected data from organisations contributing to IPBES. While there are some global biodiversity information providers, like GBIF, EU BON goes further in bridging data collection and data infrastructure and transforming the data in policy relevant reports. Much of the work by IPBES relies on such a system, and EU BON would be a major step forward and if put on a global scale (as a contribution to GEO BON) will be crucial for the work of IPBES. EU BON should aim to organise a side event at IPBES-3, maybe jointly with GEO BON.

Tim Hirsch: EU BON and all of its partners, including GBIF, have a vitally important role in providing the data and information foundations for the work IPBES will carry out to strengthen the science-policy interface. All through the IPBES process, countries have committed to build on existing initiatives, and it is encouraging to see that approach is being followed as the institutions of the new platform emerge. For example, the proposed IPBES task force on knowledge and data, based on strategic partnerships with relevant institutions, provides a space for our data mobilization and integration activities  to contribute to the assessment, knowledge generation, capacity building and policy support functions of the platform.

Ilse Geijzendorffer: By giving them the knowledge of what is required for successful assessment execution in terms of infrastructure, data management and governance. We can also provide demo results for them, for instance by computing an indicator required in one of the required assessments. Then they can start thinking of how they would like to communicate about these kinds of results and put in place the necessary procedures. We could also offer our services for a case study with a developing country on one of the identified assessments to show how their data and experts (including local and indigenous knowledge holders) could be included in the assessment.

Christoph Häuser: Yes, EU BON can and most certainly will significantly contribute to IPBES: Regardless of what the first thematic priorities for IPBES assessments and reviews will be , all assessments will ultimately depend on available, reliable and meaningful biodiversity data and information. Here, EU BON will be able to help by showing new and practical ways how to access integrated data layers and sources at various scales and for different interest and purposes. EU BON will also be able to help IPBES with its large and growing networks of institutions and experts, ranging from technical to socio-political areas.

2) How can IPBES participants best be made aware of EU BON and its relevance for IPBES?

Lluis Brotons: First of all, IPBES is a global, really ambitious initiative and EU BON faces a real challenge to effectively reach the audience currently developing the platform. EU BON should carefully select bridging channels between the work developed within the project and the IPBES priorities. Once these priorities have been identified, EU BON could easily become a key partner in providing valuable information, methods and concepts to be used in the IPBES assessments. It will be specially important to focus on the thematic assessments that IPBES plans to carry out in the first place such as pollination and food production or the methodological oriented assessment on support tools and methodologies for scenario analysis and modelling of biodiversity and ecosystem services that should be started during 2014. The main work ahead for EU BON on  making IPBES participants best aware of our work rests upon our ability to translate EU BON facilities, data and methods to the approaches and needs of the platform. We will need to be proactive here, we should not wait for IPBES to ask for help, we need to offer it in an attractive and adequate manner.

Matthew Walpole: Whilst GEO BON will be known to participants, and is mentioned in IPBES documentation, EU BON as a contributor to GEO BON is currently less visible. It's profile may be best raised in the context of GEO BON's role, with particular reference to its unique contributions, including (i) in a European context as (ii) a potential model for other regions.

Dirk S. Schmeller: One important possibility to make EU BON more visible is to show what the BON could look like, what possibilities in regard to reporting tools exist and how it could contribute to GEO BON.

Tim Hirsch: It will be important for EU BON and its partners to continue to engage actively in the various processes and procedures that are emerging from this plenary meeting: for example where we may contribute data and information to the various thematic and regional assessments of biodiversity and ecosystem services that will be carried out during the first IPBES Work Programme over the next five years.

Christoph Häuser: While IPBES is still struggling to become really operational, EU BON should strive to lead by example: it could provide concrete show cases of integrative approaches towards biodiversity information; for example, how to pull together data from different layers, such as GBIF point occurrence and habitat or land cover data for a given areas, or how to operationalise Essential Biodiversity Variables or meaningful indicators from existing data sources.
 

3) Which IPBES members/participants/stakeholders do you see as key partners for EU BON, and which ones have you contacted?

Lluis Brotons: IPBES is still shaping itself and one of the challenges ahead for the platform is the participation of stakeholders in the different processes required to complete and analyse the planned thematic assessments.  In this line, in the second IPBES plenary, different EU BON partners have been teaming up with a number of other international stakeholders (IUCN, ICSU amongst others) to ensure that the scientific community and other knowledge holders directly contribute to the key parts of process. This is essential for the credibility of the assessments and the discussions in the meetings in Turkey have strongly revolved around the forms this participation may finally take. I would stress at this point that I do not clearly see key partners in IPBES, but more of a need to be also here proactive and work with other proactive stakeholders to articulate mechanisms by which non-governmental organisations are able to feed into the process. These mechanisms are likely to be critical in the future work of EU BON.

Matthew Walpole: There are various networks, initiatives and organisations promoting better biodiversity/environmental data mobilisation, integration, management and use (such as 'Eye on Earth' convened by the Abu Dhabi Global Environmental Data Initiative (AGEDI)). GEO BON/EU BON members (including GBIF and UNEP-WCMC) participate in such networks and it would be beneficial to forge stronger collaborative links. Other obvious partners include regional/national biodiversity centres beyond Europe with which EU BON might share/compare approaches as part of regional exchange and capacity development.

Tim Hirsch: It will particularly important to engage with the members of the Multidisciplinary Expert Panel (MEP) elected from each region to guide the scientific priorities of the platform's work, based on requests from governments, as well as the many scientific bodies, civil society groups and of course governments involved in the new platform - I have contacted a good proportion of them!

Ilse Geijzendorffer: Firstly, the stakeholder representation (our infrastructure could be included in the end as in kind contribution by an institute or network). Secondly, delegates favourable of scientific IPBES involvement (e.g. Switzerland, Germany, Portugal, the Netherlands, and Germany). I have not talked to Switzerland and the Netherlands.

Christoph Häuser: During IPBES2, I had the opportunity to make contacts with NatureServe, a prime organization and big player focusing on biodiversity information in the Western Hemisphere. It is these kinds of regional or global organizations with significant experiences and substantial assets in the area of biodiversity information generation and management, which EU BON should be liaising with more. With the (current) IPBES plenary being very much dominated by governments, it will remain a good forum for scientific initiatives and projects, such as EU BON, to build links to the political level, practically from all regions.

Dirk S. Schmeller: I agree with Christoph that EU BON needs to identify key players, such as Nature Serve, Earth Watch, dataONE and others. I had the pleasure to talk to the lead scientist of Nature Serve here in Antalya, Healy Hamilton, who expressed her interest in EU BON and GEO BON to allow an exchange of experiences and technologies. Such a collaboration will likely be beneficial for both projects/organisations. My interactions with MEP members from the different UN regions as well as delegates from different countries, which were much facilitated by IPBES, also did show the huge interest of these peers in an observation system to inform policy, but also the gaps in making known EU BON and GEO BON in some regions (e.g. Caribbean were unaware of GEO BON).

4) Which will be the emerging/new areas/challenges/questions regarding biodiversity data and monitoring coming from IPBES which EU BON needs to consider / take on board?

Lluis Brotons: Since IPBES it is in its early stages it is still difficult to identify specific questions or challenges regarding biodiversity data needs for this process. However, the advice I can give to EU BON partners is that they become familiar as early as possible with the scoping of the thematic assessments planned within the context of IPBES in the forthcoming years. The information provided in the initial scoping of these assessments may be a useful tool for EU BON allowing the different groups to move their developments in line that anticipate the needs that the assessments are likely to face in the near future. Explore the scoping for the thematic assessments (amongst other IPBES documents) here (http://ipbes.net/plenary/ipbes-2-documents.html)

Matthew Walpole: EU BON could usefully consider and articulate which parts of the IPBES conceptual framework it can provide information for, as well as thinking about how it connects to regional (European), and global, assessment processes within the IPBES programme of work. Equally, given the importance within IPBES placed upon outreach and communication to decision-makers across multiple sectors, EU BON could usefully consider innovative visualisation approaches for its data products and outputs.

Tim Hirsch: One of the strong themes that has run through this IPBES meeting is the need to incorporate and recognize multiple knowledge systems, including indigenous and traditional knowledge, when carrying out assessments of biodiversity and ecosystem services. There are many challenges and opportunities arising out of this for EU BON and its partners, for example the development of community-based monitoring programmes that can contribute valuable data and information for the science-policy interface, but must be handled with due respect and sensitivity to build trust in participating communities.

Ilse Geijzendorffer: Fast track assessments, need their answers fast! Additionally, transparency of the analysis maybe not appreciated by some regional hubs or Members of the platform. This maybe posing problems for the willingness to use a shared data transfer system. Finally, if 80% of the experts will be nominated by the Members of the Platform, this can pose problems for the willingness of some expert to use transparent analysis methods. This has to be endorsed in the current protocol development.

Christoph Häuser: This remains a largely open question, as IPBES is still much preoccupied with procedural and organizational issues. With the regional approach towards assessments built into IPBES, however, it is already clear that a regional perspective towards biodiversity information and interpretation, such as an integrated European biodiversity data portal, will be a major asset to offer. As IPBES furthermore stresses the incorporation of other forms of knowledge, a focus on linking with and incorporating citizen science initiatives seems a logical follow up for EU BON.

The second plenary of the Platform met in December 2013 and agreed an ambitious work programme for 2014-2018: Details of the agreed work programme are available in the advanced meeting report of the Plenary.

The IPBES Secretariat have now issued a call for experts to help scope, advise on and deliver the work programme. Governments and relevant stakeholders can put forward nominations, from which the Multidisciplinary Expert Panel of IPBES will select a maximum of 20% of experts from the stakeholder nominations, and the rest from the government nominations.

The UK expects IPBES to make use of the best scientists/experts from all relevant disciplines - natural science, social science, economics, data and modelling and traditional knowledge, and to achieve a geographical and gender balance among those experts in the delivery of the IPBES work programme.

More information of the required topics to be covered by experts, alongside the nomination forms and how to nominate can be found in the attachments below.

The official kick-off of the EU BON project WP6 Stakeholder engagement and science-policy dialogue and WP7 Implementation of GEO BON: strategies and solutions at European and global levels took place on 18-19 February 2014 in Leipzig, Germany. The two work packages are a crucial part of the project outlining the future actions towards ensuring the integration of the project with its global counterpart GEO BON, as well as paving the road towards successful stakeholder and policy engagement.

As a result of this first meeting further short-term and long-term steps were outlined for WP6 and WP7 towards the achievement of main project objectives. These steps include shaping the future EU BON GEO BON interactions and EU BON’s approach towards stakeholder engagement.

In the following interview Ilse Geijzendorffer gives an insight on the outcomes from the meeting.

This image shows the discussions during the WP6/WP7 kick-off meeting. Credit: Eugenie Regan

1) What are the project’s main stakeholders that you are planning to approach and interact with in the future?

EU BON aims to develop a blue print for a data infrastructure for data handling, storage, indicator computation and transfer of knowledge via a data portal available to knowledge seekers. This data infrastructure thus has to be useful to data holders who want their data to be used (e.g. citizen scientists, nature associations, scientists) and to those that seek knowledge (e.g. reporting bodies). EU BON reaches out to these stakeholders and to bodies that would be interested to host or have such a data infrastructure themselves. Our first stakeholder round table focused on European knowledge seekers and existing data portals. Our second stakeholder round table planned for this summer will focus on citizen scientists and the organisations that currently handle the citizen science data, to receive input on what these two stakeholder groups would like to see in such a data infrastructure blue print.

At the same time we reach out to ongoing platforms that consist of networks of knowledge and that have needs regarding their data flow. A very important partner in the data infrastructure development is GEO BON. The coordination of GEO BON has just changed and EU BON will reinforce the ties with GEO BON during the General Assembly in Crete coming in April.

2) Science-policy dialogue proves to be a crucial part for the success of large scale projects like EU BON, how are you tackle this challenge?

The objective of EU BON is a moving target in the sense that the blue print for data infrastructure will need to suit the needs for current and future monitoring. Additionally, the actual implementation, funding and hosting of such an infrastructure could be within a structure that may not yet exist in that form today. Changes in mission, coordination and targets occur constantly. To profit from lessons learned, we are in close contact with the Biodiversity Knowledge Project; a project that has already gained experience in the last four years in identifying the most important elements for handling data requests from knowledge seekers and in developing a suitable management plan.

For EU BON to achieve and reach its moving target, we keep in touch with the changes within the biodiversity knowledge landscape (e.g. progress in IPBES, CBD reporting, European targets ad evaluations); we explore multiple scenarios for the data infrastructure, the business plan and the implementation options; and we collaborate with a large range of stakeholders to include not only their ideas and needs, but also the transitions that they go through.

Researchers and the public can now have immediate access to data underlying discovery of new species of life on Earth, under a new streamlined system linking taxonomic research with open data publication.

The partnership paves the way for unlocking and preserving a wealth of 'small data' backing up research conclusions, which often become lost within a few years of an article's publication in an academic journal.

In the first example of the new collaboration in action, the Biodiversity Data Journal carries a peer-reviewed description of a new species of spider discovered during a field course in Borneo just one month ago. At the same time, the data showing location of the spider's occurrence in nature are automatically harvested by the Global Biodiversity Information Facility (GBIF), and richer data such as images and the species description are exported to the Encyclopedia of Life (EOL).

This contrasts with an average 'shelf life' of twenty-one years between field discovery of a new species and its formal description and naming, according to a recent study in Current Biology.

A group of scientists and students discovered the new species of spider during a field course in Borneo, supervised by Jeremy Miller and Menno Schilthuizen from the Naturalis Biodiversity Center, based in Leiden, the Netherlands. The species was described and submitted online from the field to the Biodiversity Data Journal through a satellite internet connection, along with the underlying data . The manuscript was peer-reviewed and published within two weeks of submission. On the day of publication, GBIF and EOL have harvested and included the data in their respective platforms.

The new workflow established between GBIF, EOL and Pensoft Publishers' Biodiversity Data Journal, with the support of the Swiss NGO Plazi, automatically exports treatment and occurrence data into a Darwin Core Archive, a standard format used by GBIF and other networks to share data from many different sources. This means GBIF can extract these data on the day of the article's publication, making them immediately available to science and the public through its portal and web services, further enriching the biodiversity data already freely accessible through the GBIF network. Similarly, the information and multimedia resources become accessible via EOL's species pages.

One of the main purposes of the partnership is to ensure that such data remain accessible for future use in research. A recent study published in Current Biology found that 80 % of scientific data are lost in less than 10 years following their creation.

Donald Hobern, GBIF's Executive Secretary, commented: "A great volume of extremely important information about the world's species is effectively inaccessible, scattered across thousands of small datasets carefully curated by taxonomic researchers. I find it very exciting that this new workflow will help preserve these 'small data' and make them immediately available for re-use through our networks."

"Re-use of data published on paper or in PDF format is a huge challenge in all branches of science", said Prof. Lyubomir Penev, managing director of Pensoft and founder of the Biodiversity Data Journal. "This problem has been tackled firstly by our partners from Plazi who created a workflow to extract data from legacy literature and submit it to GBIF. The workflow currently launched by GBIF, EOL and the Biodiversity Data Journal radically shortens the way from publication of data to their sharing and re-use and makes the whole process cost efficient", added Prof. Penev.

The elaboration of the workflow from BDJ and Plazi to GBIF through Darwin Core Archive was supported by the EU-funded project EU BON (Building the European Biodiversity Observation Network, grant No 308454). The basic concept has been initially discussed and outlined in the course of the pro-iBiosphere project (Coordination and policy development in preparation for a European Open Biodiversity Knowledge Management System, addressing Acquisition, Curation, Synthesis, Interoperability and Dissemination, grant No 312848).

Original source:

Miller J, Schilthuizen M, Burmester J, van der Graaf L, Merckx V, Jocqué M, Kessler P, Fayle T, Breeschoten T, Broeren R, Bouman R, Chua W, Feijen F, Fermont T, Groen K, Groen M, Kil N, de Laat H, Moerland M, Moncoquet C, Panjang E, Philip A, Roca-Eriksen R, Rooduijn B, van Santen M, Swakman V, Evans M, Evans L, Love K, Joscelyne S, Tober A, Wilson H, Ambu L, Goossens B (2014) Dispatch from the field: ecology of micro web-building spiders with description of a new species. Biodiversity Data Journal 2: e1076. DOI: 10.3897/BDJ.2.e1076

The third plenary of Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES) will be held from the 12.-17. January 2015 in Bonn, Germany where also EU BON partners will attend. The IPBES secretariat already released some information notes and documents for participants that plan to join the sessions. In addition to that, some working documents for IPBES-3 are released in the meantime, like the provisional agenda and others. There are also reports being published that are relevant for the work of biodiversity networks like EU BON. Interesting reports are for example the draft of the assessment on biodiversity and ecosystem services in Europe and Central Asia (where EU BON is mentioned as a relevant research network) and other working documents for the plenary.

Please find the documents under the following link that will guide you to the specific IPBES webpage: http://ipbes.net/plenary/ipbes-3.html#three

EU BON and CETAF informatics groups had an astronomically successful meeting at Digitarium in Joensuu, Finland, 17-20 March 2015. The event coincided with solar eclipse and show of the decade for northern lights.

Major progress in data standards for information exchange took place during the week when the Biodiversity Information Standards TDWG organisation announced ratification of five new terms for quantitative biodiversity data, which had been proposed by the EU BON project one year earlier. The new terms include, in particular, organismQuantity and sampleSizeValue. This allows for exchange of ecological data in much wider scale than what has been possible until now. The participants of the meeting applauded for this occasion.

Northern lights over Joensuu Science Park 2015-03-18. Photo: Riitta Tegelberg

The meeting included a training workshop on new data sharing tools, and working sessions for designing the EU BON portal, which will allow using biodiversity observation data in research.

The 40 attendees came from 18 different countries.

Participants at the meeting.

During the meeting the attendees also were given presentations and demonstrations of Digitarium's equipment and methods for high-performance digitisation.

Data collection and analysis are at the core of modern research, and often take months or even years during which researchers remain uncredited for their contribution. A new plugin to a workflow previously developed by the Global Biodiversity Information Facility (GBIF) and Pensoft, and tested with datasets shared through GBIF and DataONE, now makes it possible to convert metadata into a manuscript for scholarly publications, with a click of a button.

Pensoft has currently implemented the feature for biodiversity, ecological and environmental data. Such records are either published through GBIF or deposited at DataONE, from where the associated metadata can be converted directly into data paper manuscripts within the ARPHA Writing Tool, where the authors may edit and finalize it in collaboration with co-authors and peers and submit it to the Biodiversity Data Journal (BDJ) with another click. Until now, the GBIF metadata have been exported into an RTF file. The new feature will be also part of future Pensoft projects, including the recently announced Research Ideas & Outcomes (RIO) Journaland the forthcoming Ecology and Sustainability Data Journal.

The concept of the data paper was introduced in the early 2000's by the Ecological Society of America in order to solve issues of handling big data and to make the metadata and the corresponding datasets discoverable and citable. It was then brought to the attention of the biodiversity community in 2011 as a result of a joint GBIF and Pensoft project and later implemented in the routine publishing process in all Pensoft journals.

Since then, Pensoft has been working with GBIF, and subsequently DataONE to automate the process of converting metadata into a human-readable data paper format. The novel workflow means that with only a couple of clicks, publishers of datasets on either GBIF, DataONE or any other portal storing metadata in the same format, may submit a manuscript for peer-review and open access citable publication in BDJ.

The process is simple, yet it brings a lot of benefits. Publishing data does not only mean a citable publication and, thus, credit to the authors and the repository itself, but it also provides the option to improve your work and collect opinion though peer-review. BDJ also shortens the distance between "narrative (text)" and "data" publishing.

"Metadata descriptions (e.g., data about the data) are of primary importance for data dissemination, sharing and re-use, as they give essential information on content, scope, purpose, fitness for use, authorship, usage rights, etc. to any potential user. Authoring detailed metadata in repositories can seem a tedious process, however DataONE users will now benefit from direct export of already created metadata into data paper manuscripts and have even better exposure of their work through discoverability mechanisms and scholarly citations," commented Dr Amber Budden, DataONE Director for Community Engagement and Outreach

"It is great to reap the fruits of a process that started back in 2010. The automated streamlining of biodiversity data between repositories and publisher is an elegant feature that makes publishing a data paper an easy and rewarding process to crown scientists data collection efforts and ensure its use and re-use," added Prof. Lyubomir Penev, Managing Director of Pensoft.

More detailed information on how data authors could use the workflow can be found on the Pensoft blog.

References:

Chavan V, Penev L (2011) The data paper: a mechanism to incentivize data publishing in biodiversity science. BMC Bioinformatics. 12(Suppl 15):S2. DOI: 10.1186/1471-2105-12-S15-S2

The work has been partially supported by the EC-FP7 EU BON project (ENV 308454, Building the European Biodiversity Observation Network) and the ITN Horizon 2020 project BIG4(Biosystematics, informatics and genomics of the big 4 insect groups: training tomorrow's researchers and entrepreneurs), under Marie Sklodovska-Curie grant agreement No. 542241.

The Royal Museum for Central Africa (RMCA) in Tervuren (Belgium) is part of the FishBase Consortium and responsible for the information on the fresh- and brackish water fishes of Africa in the FishBase database. Through an agreement with the Belgian Development Cooperation and as part of the FishBase program, the RMCA has five (5) grants available for a 3-month training program in the use of FishBase and the taxonomy of African fishes.

The training will have three subsets:

1. A detailed explanation of FishBase in all its aspects;
2. A training in the taxonomy of African fishes;
3. A case study based on data from FishBase or on taxa for which taxonomic problems have been encountered.

This course has been offered annually since 2005 and is held at the Royal Museum for Central Africa (Leuvensesteenweg 13, B-3080 Tervuren, Belgium). For more information and to apply for this three-month training grant, see: http://fishbase.africamuseum.be or www.fishbaseforafrica.org. Please note that for 2016, this course will be given in French only.

Questions? Contact Dimitri Geelhand de Merxem (dimitri.geelhand@africamuseum.be).

Substantial amount of documented occurrence records is awaiting publication stored in repositories and data indexing platforms, such as the Global Biodiversity Information Facility (GBIF), Barcode of Life Data Systems (BOLD Systems), or Integrated Digitized Biocollections (iDigBio). In order to streamline the authoring process, save taxonomists time, and provide a workflow for peer-review and quality checks, Pensoft has introduced an innovative feature that makes it possible to easily import occurrence records into a taxonomic manuscript.

Prior to this development, Pensoft's ARPHA Writing Tool (AWT) only used the "upload from Excel" approach for this workflow. Although this method significantly simplified the process of importing materials and is actively used by the authors, it still required one extra transposition step.

Now, we added a new even more user-friendly option. By simply specifying an identifier (ID) in the relevant box, the new import plugin allows for occurrence data, stored at GBIF, BOLD systems, or iDigBio, to be be directly inserted into the manuscript. It all happens in the user-friendly environment of the AWT, where the imported data can be then edited before submission to the Biodiversity Data Journal.

Not having to retype or copy/paste species occurrence records, the authors save a lot of efforts. Moreover, they automatically import them in a structured Darwin Core format, which can be easily downloaded from the article text into structured data by anyone who needs the data for reuse after publication.

Another important aspect of the workflow is that it will serve as a platform for peer-review, publication and curation of raw data, that is of unpublished individual data records coming from collections or observations stored at GBIF, BOLD and iDigBio.

The work has been partially supported by the EC-FP7 EU BON project (ENV 308454, Building the European Biodiversity Observation Network) and the ITN Horizon 2020 project BIG4(Biosystematics, informatics and genomics of the big 4 insect groups: training tomorrow's researchers and entrepreneurs), under Marie Sklodovska-Curie grant agreement No. 542241.