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A variety of neurological syndromes—occurring more frequently in Europe because of the greater neurotropism of Borrelia garinii—have been described in neuroborreliosis. Recent case reports and two cohort studies describe the probable association between Lyme disease and inflammatory demyelinating polyneuropathy. Our case series reports on 3 patients with Guillain-Barre syndrome (GBS), and 2 patients with chronic inflammatory demyelinating polyneuropathy (CIDP) which are most probably linked to neuroborreliosis as antecedent infection. These cases originate from a series of n = 53 with Lyme neuroborreliosis diagnosed in the period 2011-2017. Cerebrospinal fluid analysis and serological and chemokine testing suggest GBS and CIDP are part of late neuroborreliosis rather than acute neuroborreliosis. We discuss if Lyme disease, known for its neurotropism, is a mimicker of Guillain-Barre syndrome or its variants due to active infection of the nervous system or if Borrelia sp. is only one of the many pathogens known to induce these syndromes as a consequence of its immunogenic capacity. Our case series and earlier reported cases suggest that among other infections, Lyme disease could trigger autoimmune response with anti-neuronal reactivity leading to neurologic injury. Such post-infectious autoimmune-mediated acute and chronic inflammatory demyelinating polyneuropathy could be more frequent/important than radiculoneuropathies occurring in the acute stadium of neuroborreliosis.

A report on the results and outcome of the Green Pioneers (NL: Groene Pioniers) project (2019-2020), a citizen science project by Meise Botanic Garden, to increase awareness on invasive species and to increase quality and quantity of invasive species data. This project was financed by the Flemish government, Department of Economy, Science and Innovation (EWI)., Green Pioneers is a citizen project of Meise Botanic Garden financed by the Flemish government, Department of Economy, Science and Innovation (EWI).

Invasieve planten vormen een ernstige en aanhoudende bedreiging voor de inheemse biodiversiteit. Ze kunnen de plek innemen van minder competitieve planten, ecologische netwerken verstoren, middelen voor de ene soort verminderen en voor de andere doen toenemen. De meeste planten die geïntroduceerd worden in nieuwe regio’s doen dat met behulp van de mens, zeer vaak vanuit tuinen. Eens invasieve planten in opmars zijn, is het zeer moeilijk tot bijna onmogelijk hen terug te dringen. Daarom is het belangrijk in de eerste plaats te voorkomen dat ze zich verspreiden. Om het bewustzijn met betrekking tot dit probleem in België te verhogen, hebben we een informatieve zoekkaart ontworpen om mensen te helpen invasieve planten te herkennen en om uit te leggen wat men precies kan doen om de situatie te verbeteren.

Les plantes exotiques envahissantes représentent un risque réel et grandissant pour la biodiversité autochtone. Elles peuvent remplacer les plantes endémiques moins compétitives et perturber les réseaux écologiques, diminuant ainsi les ressources de certaines espèces tout en les augmentant pour d’autres. L’introduction dans de nouvelles zones de la plupart de ces plantes invasives résulte de l’activité humaine et souvent via les jardineries. Les plantes invasives sont vigoureuses et leur control difficile, souvent impossible. Réduire le taux de propagation de ces espèces est donc important. Afin de sensibiliser à ce problème en Belgique, nous avons créé une infographie pour aider les citoyens à reconnaitre certaines des plantes invasives les plus communes tout en donnant des conseils à celles et ceux qui voudraient améliorer la situation.

Invasive plants are a real and growing risk to native biodiversity. They can displace less competitive plants, disturb ecological networks, reducing resources for some species and increasing them for others. Most plants are introduced to new areas by human activity, often from gardens. Invasive plants are vigorous and their control is difficult, often impossible, so reducing the rate at which they are spread is important. To raise awareness of the issue in Belgium we have created an infographic to help people recognise some invasive plants and to explain what people can do to ameliorate the situation.

The digitization of herbaria and their online access will greatly facilitate access to plant collections around the world. This will improve the efficiency of taxonomy and help reduce inequalities between scientists. The Botanic Garden Meise, Belgium, is currently digitizing 1.2 million specimens including label data. In this paper we describe the user requirements analysis conducted for a new herbarium web portal. The aim was to identify the required functionality, but also to assist in the prioritization of software development and data acquisition. The Garden conducted the analysis in cooperation with Clockwork, the digital engagement agency of Ordina. Using a series of interactive interviews, potential users were consulted from universities, research institutions, science-policy initiatives and the Botanic Garden Meise. Although digital herbarium data have many potential stakeholders, we focused on the needs of taxonomists, ecologists and historians, who are currently the primary users of the Meise herbarium data portal. The three categories of user have similar needs, all wanted as much specimen data as possible, and for those data, to be interlinked with other digital resources within and outside the Garden. Many users wanted an interactive system that they could comment on, or correct online, particularly if such corrections and annotations could be used to rank the reliability of data. Many requirements depend on the quality of the digitized data associated with each specimen. The essential data fields are the taxonomic name; geographic location; country; collection date; collector name and collection number. Also all researchers valued linkage between biodiversity literature and specimens. Nevertheless, to verify digitized data the researchers still want access to high quality images, even if fully transcribed label information is provided. The only major point of disagreement is the level of access users should have and what they should be allowed to do with the data and images. Not all of the user requirements are feasible given the current technical and regulatory landscape, however, the potential of these suggestions is discussed. Currently, there is no off-the-shelf solution to satisfy all these user requirements, but the intention of this paper is to guide other herbaria who are prioritising their investment in digitization and online web functionality., SCOPUS: ar.j, info:eu-repo/semantics/published

When researchers and managers are asked to rank the issues that prevent adequate control of invasive species, lack of public awareness is at the top of the list (Dehnen‐Schmutz et al. 2018). It is therefore imperative to raise the general public's awareness of the potential risks of introducing alien species into the wild. Green Pioneers, a citizen science project funded by the Flemish Government, (Fig. 1) aims to address this issue in Belgium, across age groups. The project aims to Create awareness on invasive species, highlighting how invasions can be avoided and how to mitigate their impact. Improve communication between citizens and scientists on conservation and invasive plant species. Augment the quality and quantity of data on invasive species. Create awareness on invasive species, highlighting how invasions can be avoided and how to mitigate their impact. Improve communication between citizens and scientists on conservation and invasive plant species. Augment the quality and quantity of data on invasive species. The project is developing three kinds of activity, specifically to attract a broad demographic: - 'Young Pioneers', by developing tools for teachers in science, technology, engineering and mathemathics for school children from 12-15 years old. - 'Online Pioneers', through our online citizen science platform DoeDat.be, by helping with the transcription of label information on herbarium specimens, - and 'Visiteers', by inviting companies and working age people to help us in the collection and to inform them about invasive species. Finally, we will be organizing a BioBlitz in spring 2020 at Meise Botanic Garden where we will celebrate plants and all our Green Pioneers, while also spreading the message of invasive plant awareness. During our 48 hour BioBlitz, scientists, volunteers and citizens are workig together to survey the biodiversity of our Botanic Garden. Ultimately, Green Pioneers aim to encourage recording of alien species by amateur botanists and create a generation of responsible gardeners who understand the consequences of releasing invasive alien plants into the wild.

Neuroborreliosis can induce a variety of neurological syndromes: e.g., cranial neuritis, plexitis, radiculitis, meningitis, cerebellitis, ... We report on five cases of patients with a diagnosis of neuroborreliosis based on clinical symptoms, serologic tests and MR imaging results. However, neither of them fulfils the diagnostic criteria for definite neuroborreliosis. Are the diagnostic criteria still valid or is there a need to revise them? Is our diagnosis correct? Are these cases post-Lyme auto-immune neuronal inflammation, and not due to still active spirochetal infection? Do we need to consider immunosuppressive therapy instead of third-generation cephalosporins?

The precious historical collection of fibres in Meise Botanic Garden, with over 500 specimens in old hand-blown glass jars, was rehabilitated in 2017. Most of the specimens date back to the second half of the 19th century, a period of technological revolution. The rehabilitation retraces the industrious search for every possible raw material provided by nature at that time. The result is astonishing, not only regarding the origin and quality of the preserved material, its label information and its accompanying manuscripts, but also because of the extremely wide range of fibre species and their processing. Noted collectors enriching our collections were, inter alios, the Josephite Brother Bernardin of Melle (Belgium), Carl von Martius and his brother Theodor Martius of Erlangen (Germany) and Henri Van Heurck of Antwerp (Belgium). Famous museums and botanic gardens such as the Museum of French Colonies in Paris (France) and the Experimental Garden in Eala (Democratic Republic of the Congo DRC) were also important suppliers. Samples originate from all over the world with strong representation from India, the DRC and Brazil. The nature of the fibres in the collection is very diverse and ranges from stem, bark and leaf fibres to husk fibres and seed hairs. Some of them have been processed into bundles and braids, beaten bark, spun thread and twined rope, as well as rough or organza-like fabrics. Even plant pith, pulp and paper are included, next to silkworm silk and mineral tremolite (a form of asbestos). Not only are familiar plant fibres such as cotton, sisal, ramie, coir, flax and jute present, but also Congo jute, Cuban bast, lacebark, piassava, esparto, fern wool, fibres of linden, sunflower, banana and pineapple, next to different types of paper and bark cloth. More than a hundred genera appear. Dominant families in terms of specimen numbers are Malvaceae (including Tiliaceae), Liliaceae (including Agavaceae), Palmae, Urticaceae, Bombacaceae, Musaceae and Gramineae. This upgraded collection exhibits an unexpected data diversity and consequently offers multitudinous possibilities for innovative research. One of our mission statements is undoubtedly: safeguarding historical collections for the future.

Many, if not most, countries have several official or widely used languages. And most, if not all, of these countries have herbaria. Furthermore, specimens have been exchanged between herbaria from many countries, so herbaria are often polylingual collections. It is therefore useful to have label transcription systems that can attract users proficient in a wide variety of languages. Belgium is a typical polylingual country at the boundary between the Romance and Franconian languages (French, Dutch & German). Yet, currently there are few non-English transcription platforms for citizen science. This is why in Belgium we built DoeDat, from the Digivol system of the Atlas of Living Australia. We will be demonstrating DoeDat and its multilingual features. We will explain how we enter translations, both for the user interface and for the dynamic parts of the website. We will share our experiences of running a multilingual site and the challenges it brings. Translating and running such a website requires skilled personnel and patience. However, our experience has been positive and the number and quality of our volunteer transcriptions has been rewarding. We look forward to the further use of DoeDat to transcribe data in many other languages. There are no reasons anymore to exclude willing volunteers in any language.

Globally there are a number of citizen science portals to support digitisation of biodiversity collections. Digitisation not only involves imaging of the specimen itself, but also includes the digital transcription of label and ledger data, georeferencing and linking to other digital resources. Making use of the skills and enthusiasm of volunteers is potentially a good way to reduce the great backlog of specimens to be digitised. These citizen science portals engage the public and are liberating data that would otherwise remain on paper. There is also considerable scope for expansion into other countries and languages. Therefore, should we continue to expand? Volunteers give their time for free, but the creation and maintenance of the platform is not without costs. Given a finite budget, what can you get for your money? How does the quality compare with other methods? Is crowdsourcing of label transcription faster, better and cheaper than other forms of transcription system? We will summarize the use of volunteer transcription from our own experience and the reports of other projects. We will make our evaluation based on the costs, speed and quality of the systems and reach conclusions on why you should or should not use this method.

The botanicalcollections.be website (http://www.botanicalcollections.be) is the culmination of the three year Digitale Ontsluiting Erfgoedcollecties (DOE!) project. Over this period we have digitally imaged 1.2 million African and Belgian herbarium specimens and much of their label data. All these data are freely available on our new virtual herbarium www.botanicalcollections.be. For this we have to thank a generous grant from the Flemish Government. The site was officially launched on the 23rd March, 2018, at the Fourth Annual Meeting of Plant Ecology and Evolution held at Bouchout Castle in Meise Botanic Garden (https://sites.google.com/plantentuinmeise.be/ampee4/). Before developing the website we conducted a user requirements analysis (Vissers et al. 2017. These requirements formed the basis for development from initial design to the finished product. Lots of features were incorporated to make the site as user-friendly and usable as possible; persistent URIs, zoomable and downloadable images and access to data. Each specimen can be annotated and is available in a machine readable format. The goal of the botanicalcollections.be website is not only to make digitized specimens from the Botanic Garden available, but also to centralize and display the herbarium specimens from other Belgian herbaria. A cooperation agreement will make collaboration easy and transparent. The benefits to herbaria of participating in this virtual herbarium include greater publicity, the ability to show how their specimens contribute to overall knowledge, and a mechanism for identifying where to focus future collecting efforts, all of which help validate their worth to institutional administrators. In addition, such cooperation helps build professional relationships who, because of disparate interests and obligations, might not normally connect with each other.

Specimen labels are written in numerous languages and accurate interpretation requires local knowledge of place names, vernacular names and people’s names. In many countries more than one language is in common usage. Belgium, for example, has three official languages. Crowdsourcing has helped many collections digitize their labels and generates useful data for science. Furthermore, direct engagement of the public with a herbarium increases the collection’s visibility and potentially reinforces a sense of common ownership. For these reasons we built DoeDat, a multilingual crowdsourcing platform forked from Digivol of the Australian Museum (Figs 1, 2). Some of the useful features we inherited from Digivol include a georeferencing tool, configurable templates, simple project management and individual institutional branding. Running a multilingual website does increase the work needed to setup and manage projects, but we hope to gain from the broader engagement we can attract. Currently, we are focusing our work on Belgian collections were Dutch and French are the primary languages, but in the future we may expand our languages when we work on our international collections. We also hope that we can eventually merge our code with that of Digivol, so that we can both benefit from each other's developments.

The collections of Meise Botanic Garden comprise extensive and varied documentation on the genus Rosa. The library collection contains valuable and often rare 19th century publications about the genus Rosa, frequently with annotations by François Crépin. In addition to this, the archives hold the unpublished manuscripts and thousands of letters from Crépin’s correspondents reflecting the extraordinary scientific network he built up to facilitate the exchange of herbarium collections together with erudite discussions on the taxonomy of the genus Rosa. Crépin exchanged letters with all the important rhodologists of his time, such as E. Burnat, H. Christ, P.A. Déséglise, P.E. Parmentier, H. Takashima, and W. Wirtgen, and also with horticulturists, such as J. Gravereaux. This unique network and diversified patrimony of historical collections took shape over a period of several decades during which Crépin prepared a monograph of the genus Rosa that unfortunately was never finished. Crépin assembled a 19th century herbarium with ca. 40 000 specimens of the genus Rosa. In contrast to other important herbaria, the Crépin collection covers the whole natural area of distribution of Rosa and documents an unparalleled range of Rose taxa. The combination of documentary sources of several different types makes the collections of Meise Botanic Garden extremely valuable. They offer great opportunities for multidisciplinary studies by taxonomists and historians with the aim of solving the still insufficiently understood relations between taxa in the genus Rosa. Linking this unique heritage of Meise Botanic Garden with present-day molecular techniques promises rewarding research in the near future. We can conclude that the collections related to Roses are major masterpieces of the Garden. In 2016 the Piaget Foundation, the World Federation of Rose Societies and ‘De Vrienden van de Roos’, supported the Botanic Garden with a grant which allowed us to image 13 000 out of the 40 000 herbarium sheets. The public is invited to help us generate the label data on the Garden’s crowdsourcing platform (https://www.doedat.be/). In this project we tested also the quality of extracted DNA of 96 specimens of the Crépin Herbarium. 69% of the samples yielded with the Nanodrop technology good quality and quantity of DNA and for 29% of the samples it was even possible to amplify the rDNA gene marker ITS (with 650bp). These results are encouraging and illustrate that this historic herbarium could be a useful tool for research on roses.

The Botanic Garden Meise (BR) has been involved in a mass digitization project over the past 2.5 years. At present, over 1.2 million herbarium specimens have been imaged. A third of these images already have minimal data, while the remainder data are presently being captured and should be finished in the coming months. Many lessons have been learned along the way with respect to the pitfalls of implementing mass digitization, both technically and sociologically. Mass digitization has also fundamentally changed the management workflow of our collections. This includes the creation of new protocols to ensure that new and returning material be photographed before being incorporated into already digitized collections, thus ensuring that data are not lost. A new portal has been created following an independent analysis of user requirements. This will result in increased visibility of our collections, making them more discoverable. The new portal provides additional functionality, including unique stable Uniform Resource Identifiers (URI) for each specimen and a machine readable version of the data. These identifiers follow the recommendations of the Consortium of European Taxonomic Facilities (http://cetaf.org/cetaf-stable-identifiers). The identifiers are a valuable tool and resource for researchers, but it is incumbent upon them to use this resource responsibly for the citation of specimens. Many research staff have not been actively involved in the mass digitization exercise and need to be educated on its impact and importance. As more and more images and data are linked to publications, they become easier to evaluate and verify. These digital data may also be repurposed in other studies, thus advancing science and herbarium management. As an increased number of institutions place their collections online, the greater this resource becomes for both collection management as well as research, particularly as links between collections become apparent. These links may include improved georeferencing, establishing collector itineraries, and new determinations for duplicate specimens.

Mass digitization is a large undertaking for a collection. It is disruptive of routine and can challenge long-held practises. Having been through the procedure and survived, we feel we have a lot of experience to share with other institutions who are considering taking on this challenge. The changes that digitization has made to our institution are positive and the digitization a success, but that is not to say that we would not have done some things differently, were we to repeat the exercise. In 2015 Meise Botanic Garden received a grant from the Flemish Government to upgrade its digitization infrastructure and mass digitize 1.2 million specimens from its African and Belgian Herbaria. The new infrastructure improved our workflow significantly, enabling us to digitize specimens five to ten times faster while also improving their quality. The mass digitization part of the project was split into two parts, imaging and transcription. The contract was awarded and out-sourced to Picturae, who started imaging in May 2016 using a conveyor belt installation. Prior to starting, a significant amount of preparation was required at the herbarium. Within one year, 1.2 million specimens were imaged. The images were captured as TIFF files and stored in triplicate at The Flemish Institute for Archiving (VIAA), while smaller derived JPEG 2000 and JPEG files were generated for day-to-day use. The second part of the project was label transcription. A third of the specimens were transcribed in-house for capturing minimal data (barcode, filing name, collector, collector number & country of origin). This was partly done to reduce costs, but also allowed us to compare in-house to out-sourced transcription. Some 500,000 specimens were transcribed, either completely or partially, by Alembo (subcontracted by Picturae).The remaining 200.000 specimens from our Belgian Herbarium are being transcribed using crowdsourcing. The latter is being realized through the citizen science platform DoeDat (www.doedat.be) that was launched in November 2017. Many lessons have been learnt with respect to implementing mass digitization, both practically and sociologically. Many of the problems encountered during the project could have been avoided by changing the workflow. The addition of extra control points during the process could have reduced problems encountered later in the data capture process. Solving these problems at a later stage was time consuming. Trying to “save money” can result in a disruptive workflow, which may lead to a number of costly errors. Mass digitization has fundamentally changed the workflow in our collections and the way in which our herbarium is managed. All images for the African and Belgian collections may be now found on our new virtual herbarium www.botanicalcollections.be.

Herbarium specimens hold a wealth of data about plants; where they come from, where they were collected and by whom. Once digitized, these data can be searched, mapped and compared. However, the information on specimens is often handwritten and even the best software systems cannot read it. This is where we get real value from citizen involvement. Digitizing these data is only possible with the aid of human intelligence. DoeDat is a multilingual open-source platform for transcription, based upon the DigiVol program of the Australian Museum and Atlas of Living Australia. DoeDat is a product of our digitization project Digital Access to Cultural Heritage Collections (DOE!), funded by the Flemish Government. DoeDat is about creating data and also, ‘Doe Dat’ means ‘do that’ in Dutch. DoeDat will help us digitize our collections, and will also give the public the chance to take an active part in the process. We aim to build a community of enthusiastic online volunteers who will help us liberate botanical data from specimen labels and documents. We launched the platform on Science Day and within two months, more than one hundred volunteers had transcribed more than 4,000 specimens. Join in at www.DoeDat.be

Background – On the occasion of the 80 th anniversary of Pierre Compère, a catalogue of all algal and cyanobacterial taxa he described during his scientific career, was compiled. Methods – This catalogue was assembled through consultation of Compère's numerous publications, database queries and contacts with different herbaria where his types are deposited. Results – Pierre Compère described 123 new algal and cyanobacterial taxa. Most of the species belong to the Bacillariophyta, but he also published taxa in the Cyanobacteria, Chlorophyta, Chrysophyta and Euglenophyta. For each taxon, details on the location of the type specimens are included along with their sample localities, dates and references to the protologues. A selection of pictures and drawings are added to illustrate Pierre Compère's work. One name, Caloneis silicula f. angusta is being formally validated.

We compared the automated Paragon 2000 clinical capillary zone electrophoresis (CZE) system with two manual methods, agarose electrophoresis (AGE) and cellulose acetate electrophoresis (CAE). Reference intervals in healthy adults were determined for each method. When compared with AGE and CAE, CZE gave substantially higher reference values for the α1-globulin fraction. With CZE, within-run precision for fraction quantitation was between 0.5% (albumin) and 4.1% (α1-globulin). Total precision was between 0.8% (albumin) and 5.3% (β-globulin). Data obtained from CZE showed poor linear correlation with results obtained by AGE but good linear correlation with data from CAE. Analysis of serum from patients with inter alia inflammation, nephrotic syndrome, or polyclonal gammopathy showed that clinical information obtained by CZE is comparable with information obtained by AGE and CAE. We conclude that CZE offers a clinically reliable alternative to AGE and CAE and has the advantages of automation, higher precision, and faster turnaround time.

A selection of 58 specimens with a monoclonal component identified by immunoelectrophoresis and/or immunofixation was analyzed with the immunosubtraction procedure on the Paragon 2000 capillary electrophoresis system. The capillary system detected 93% of the paraproteins and, using immunosubtraction, correctly identified 91% of the paraproteins. Paraproteins that were detected by immunofixation and/or immunoelectrophoresis but not by capillary electrophoresis were also missed by agarose electrophoresis and cellulose acetate electrophoresis. Cellulose acetate electrophoresis was the least sensitive method for detection of paraproteins. Only 74% of the monoclonal components were detected by this technique, whereas 86% were revealed by agarose electrophoresis. In addition to monoclonal paraproteins, we also studied biclonal paraproteins and oligoclonal banding. Capillary electrophoresis and immunosubtraction correctly detected and identified three specimens containing biclonal paraproteins. In one specimen, capillary zone electrophoresis detected only one band, whereas agarose gel electrophoresis detected two bands. The sensitivity for detection and identification of oligoclonal banding by capillary electrophoresis was inferior to immunofixation.

The Herbarium of Meise Botanic Garden is in the top 15 herbaria worldwide. The collection comprises some four million specimens, which are important for scientific research. Digitisation of specimens includes imaging, transcription of label information, linking data and making the results publicly accessible online. In addition to facilitating researchers’ access to specimens, digitisation also brings new possibilities for analysis and discovery of new data, such as the vast amount of information on handwritten labels. In the DOE! project (Digitale Ontsluiting Erfgoedcollecties), funded by the Flemish Government, 1.2 million herbarium sheets from the African and Belgian collections were digitised. We have received additional funding to digitise a further 1.4 million specimens for the remaining vascular plants and macro-algae collections, by October 2021. These include the historic collections of Von Martius and Van Heurck. Carl Friedrich Philipp von Martius (1794–1868) was a pioneering explorer whose expeditions led to the discovery of many species. He amassed over 300,000 specimens, some of which were used to compile the first Flora of Brazil. Henri Van Heurck (1838–1909) also gathered herbarium specimens from all over the world, including a specimen originally from the collection of Linnaeus. Despite this being our second mass digitisation project, there are significant differences in our approach. This is partly due to lessons learned from the first project and partly to the nature of the collections themselves. The differences in the tendering process, specimen preparation, workflow and data capture will be explained. Making these specimens openly available online through www.botanicalcollections.be is valuable to scientific research as well as valorising of our collections. Currently, the site attracts 7000 users a year, which adds up to 15,000 sessions a year and the average session is more than 8 minutes. This means that people are actively using our website and these numbers can be expected to grow as we add more specimens and functionality.