The document summarizes the Biodiversity Heritage Library (BHL) project, which aims to digitize literature related to biodiversity and make it openly accessible online. It discusses the taxonomic impediment caused by limited access to literature. The BHL partnership involves major natural history libraries working to scan literature and make it searchable through a central portal. The Smithsonian Institution Libraries plays a key role in the project through hosting staff, providing materials to scan, and assisting with technical development.
Salient Features of India constitution especially power and functions
Smithsonian Libraries 2.0 and the Biodiversity Heritage Library Project
1. Smithsonian Libraries 2.0 and the Biodiversity Heritage Library Project Martin R. Kalfatovic Smithsonian Institution Libraries Smithsonian Libraries :: SIL Board Meeting :: 26 June 2009
13. The Taxonomic Impediment “ The taxonomic impediment is a term that describes the gaps of knowledge in our taxonomic system” - Darwin Declaration, 1998
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15. Biologia Centrali-Americana Biologia Centrali-Americana Edited by Frederick Ducane Godman and Osbert Salvin London : Pub. for the editors by R. H. Porter, 1879-1915 Chart showing distribution in public collections of the complete 63 volume sets held worldwide. 2 complete copies in Central America held at the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute Library
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18. American Museum of Natural History (New York) Field Museum (Chicago) Natural History Museum (London) Smithsonian Institution Libraries (Washington) Missouri Botanical Garden (St. Louis) New York Botanical Garden (New York) Royal Botanic Garden, Kew Botany Libraries, Harvard University Ernst Mayr Library of the Museum of Comparative Zoology, Harvard University Marine Biological Laboratory / Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution Academy of Natural Sciences (Philadelphia) California Academy of Sciences (San Francisco)
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21. Initial grant from the MacArthur and Sloan Foundations (as part of the Encyclopedia of Life grant) Additional support from parent institutions Supplemental grants in place for specific development (e.g. Moore Foundation for Fedora) Additional grants being actively pursued by BHL and individual members
22. Costs 10 cents per page (scanning costs from Internet Archive) 13 cents per page for additional SIL provided work (administration, pulling materials, scanning quality review, metadata review, etc.) Average book length 304 pages Average cost per book: $70.00
23. How much is there: Core literature pre-1923: 100 million pages (?) All pre-1923: 120-150 million pages All literature: 280-320 million pages
24. … Names… Rectification of Names (Cheng Ming) What is necessary is to rectify names … If names be not correct, language is not in accordance with the truth of things. If language be not in accordance with the truth of things, affairs cannot be carried on to success. The Analects of Confucius Book 13, verse 3 (Legge translation, 1980)
46. Encyclopedia of Life … imagine for a moment that all the diversity of the world were finally revealed and then described, say one page to a species. The description would contain the scientific name, a photograph or drawing, a brief diagnosis, and information of where the species if found. If published in conventional book form … this Great Encyclopedia of Life would occupy 60 meters of library shelf per million species … 100 million species of organisms … would extend through 6 kilometers of shelving … E.O. Wilson (1992)
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48. H Informatics Marine Biological Laboratory Missouri Botanical Garden Species Pages & Secretariat Smithsonian Education and Outreach Smithsonian & Harvard Synthesis Center Field Museum
49. Built from a variety of new and existing sources Views available for varying levels of expertise from novice to expert Legacy literature a key component of the EOL species pages Encyclopedia of Life Species Pages
51. In any well-appointed Natural History Library there should be found every book and every edition of every book dealing in the remotest way with the subjects concerned. Charles Davies Sherborn, Epilogue to Index Animalium , March 1922 A Global Library for Life
Over 250 years of systematic description of life Systema naturae (10th ed. 1758) by Carl von Linné
Taxonomic Literature: Taxonomic descriptions must be published for the name to be valid Publications must be available to the public through trusted sources Libraries have been the traditional place
BHL Focus: Literature Core literature pre-1923: 100 million pages (?) All pre-1923: 120-150 million pages All literature: 280-320 million pages
So, remembering that a key concept of Confucius was the Rectification of Names …
Suzanne But remember to have it really named it has to be PUBLISHED So this specimen is referenced in a book that says that it was found, identified, named and that it now “exists” – We won’t going into Buddhist theory of existence in this presentation.
Suzanne But remember to have it really named it has to be PUBLISHED So this specimen is referenced in a book that says that it was found, identified, named and that it now “exists” – We won’t going into Buddhist theory of existence in this presentation.
Taxonomic intelligence 10.7 million name strings in NameBank Uses sophisticated algorithm (TaxonGrab) to locate likely name strings in OCR text Iterative processing of BHL texts will both increase the number of name strings in NameBank and increase the accuracy of name string recognition
BHL and publishers
Permissions Seek permissions from copyright holders Opt in Copyright Model: The BHL will actively work with professional societies and associations to integrate their publications into the BHL in a way that serves the societies’ missions and goals BHL will digitize learned society backfiles and mount them through the BHL Portal at no cost. Will provide a set of files to the publishers for reuse as they see fit.
Permissions Seek permissions from copyright holders Opt in Copyright Model: The BHL will actively work with professional societies and associations to integrate their publications into the BHL in a way that serves the societies’ missions and goals BHL will digitize learned society backfiles and mount them through the BHL Portal at no cost. Will provide a set of files to the publishers for reuse as they see fit.
BHL advantages Use of the articles will increase as evidenced by citation upsurge Long-term management of the digital assets is provided by the BHL at no cost Publishers’ content is embedded in the emerging knowledge ecology that is sweeping biology in this century Structural markup of backfiles into conformance with NLM DTD (just starting)
Suzanne
Scribe Machine Single Scribe Machine Custom built by the Internet Archive Human operated 3,500 page per shift per day
Internet Archive/BHL scanning centers Northeast Regional Scanning Center 10 Scribe machines MBL/WHOI Harvard New York Public Library 10 Scribe machines AMNH NYBG
Internet Archive/BHL scanning centers Washington, DC 1 Scribe machine at Smithsonian Libraries 10 Scribe facility at Library of Congress with Fedlink (operational Spring 2008)
Scanning stats 5.5 million plus total pages scanned (and growing daily) <90,000 Fieldiana (via UIUC) >100,000 pages each Harvard, New York Botanical Garden, 225,000+ pages from the American Museum of Natural History 400,000+ from Smithsonian Libraries 500,000+ from the Natural History Museum, London 800,000 Missouri Botanical Garden Library 1,000,000+ from the MBL/WHOI library
Scanning stats 5.5 million plus total pages scanned (and growing daily) <90,000 Fieldiana (via UIUC) >100,000 pages each Harvard, New York Botanical Garden, 225,000+ pages from the American Museum of Natural History 400,000+ from Smithsonian Libraries 500,000+ from the Natural History Museum, London 800,000 Missouri Botanical Garden Library 1,000,000+ from the MBL/WHOI library
Scanning stats 5.5 million plus total pages scanned (and growing daily) <90,000 Fieldiana (via UIUC) >100,000 pages each Harvard, New York Botanical Garden, 225,000+ pages from the American Museum of Natural History 400,000+ from Smithsonian Libraries 500,000+ from the Natural History Museum, London 800,000 Missouri Botanical Garden Library 1,000,000+ from the MBL/WHOI library
Martin: BHL Portal
BHL and EOL
Structure of EOL Built from a variety of new and existing sources Views available for varying levels of expertise from novice to expert Legacy literature a key component of the EOL species pages
Suzanne Integrate Literature Launch in February
A Global Library for Life In any well-appointed Natural History Library there should be found every book and every edition of every book dealing in the remotest way with the subjects concerned. Charles Davies Sherborn, Epilogue to Index Animalium , March 1922