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ABCD 3.0 - A community platform for the development and documentation of the ABCD standard for natural history collections

ABCD (Access to Biological Collection Data) is an international standard for the exchange of biological collection and observation data. Development started in 2001; in 2005 it was ratified as an XML schema as TDWG standard (Biodiversity Information Standards). From the outset the ABCD development was based on an XML schema and the documentation of the individual concepts is represented as XML annotations. New ABCD-versions are created periodically by consolidating and integrating user requirements collected by the coordination team at the Botanic Garden and Botanical Museum Berlin-Dahlem (BGBM). This method was effective in the first decade of the ABCD development. However, due to a growing and diversifying user community and the introduction of semantic technologies it is reaching certain limits. The ABCD concepts are arranged hierarchically and are referenced by their xpath from the root node. A direct use in the Semantic Web is therefore not possible. The proposed project aims to develop a platform that provides ABCD concepts in a machine-readable form, together with a versioned documentation. The dependency of the ABCD concepts from an XML schema will be resolved and the concepts will be provided as an ontology for the Semantic Web. The version 3.0 of the ABCD standards will include the concepts developed by various domain specific extensions and will be made available both as an XML schema and as an ontology in the Semantic Web.

Main project goals

• establishing a platform for collaborative work on ABCD development
• changing from XML based, hierarchically organized schema to ontology-based provision of single concepts with documentation in a machine readable form (RDF)
• provision of versioned documentation
• reviewing, structuring, and improving existing ABCD concepts and their documentation including controlled vocabularies
• incorporating new, required ABCD concepts
• development of application schemas
• community driven approach: intensive communication with existing and new Interest / Expert Groups enabling active contribution to standard development
  • Examples: Global Genome Biodiversity Network (GGBN), geological and paleontological data (Extension for Geosciences, EFG), multimedia data Biodiversitäts‐Netzwerk des Humboldt‐Rings (BiNHum - ABCD 2.1), plot-based data, microorganisms and cell culture data

The project "ABCD 3.0 - A community platform for the development and documentation of the ABCD standard for natural history collections" is funded under the LIS infrastructure platform. Involved partners are the Botanical Garden and Botanical Museum Berlin-Dahlem (BGBM) and the Museum für Naturkunde Berlin (MfN).