Catalogue Of Life Plus (Col+)

The Catalogue of Life Plus (CoL+) project is a collaboration between the Catalogue of Life, the Global Biodiversity Information Facility Secretariat, Naturalis Biodiversity Center and partners with financial support by the Netherlands Biodiversity Information Facility and the Netherlands Ministry of Education, Science, and Culture. All information related to species is tied to a scientific name. The Catalogue of Life has the mission to catalogue all known species: an authoritative consensus taxonomy produced by the global taxonomic community. Up to now it has completed peer-reviewed inclusion of nearly all extant species. The thus formed authoritative index allows the Catalogue of Life to serve as a means for linking biological species information. Many large institutional users (i.e. GBIF, EOL, ALA, Lifewatch) extend their copy of the catalogue with additional names and species to complete it to serve their own specific purpose. These disconnected efforts result in ‘taxonomic inconsistencies’ and cause confusion amongst users. The CoL+ project seeks to replace these efforts with a shared, extended catalogue and complete the reviewed name coverage without sacrificing quality. Creating an open, shared, and sustainable consensus taxonomy to serve the proper linking of data in the global biodiversity information initiatives is the ultimate goal the project contributes to. The goals for the Catalogue of Life Plus (CoL+) project are: creating both an extended and a strictly scrutinized taxonomic catalogue to replace the current GBIF Backbone Taxonomy and Catalogue of Life separating nomenclature (facts) and taxonomy (opinion) with different identifiers and authorities for names and taxa for better reuse providing (infrastructural) support to the completion and strengthening of taxonomic and nomenclature content authorities ensuring a sustainable, robust, and more dynamic IT infrastructure for maintaining the Catalogue of Life. Specifically the project will establish a clearinghouse for taxonomy and nomenclature and rebuild all existing infrastructure of the Catalogue of Life including webservices, the portal and the software for the assembly of the catalogue and its editorial work.