Category: BMD

Advancing eScience for biodiversity: Pensoft at the LifeWatch ERIC Biodiversity & Ecosystem eScience Conference

The conference facilitated valuable networking opportunities, meeting us with old friends but also giving us a chance to discuss potential future collaborations.

Between 30 June and 3 July, Pensoft’s team attended the LifeWatch ERIC Biodiversity & Ecosystem eScience Conference (BEeS) in Heraklion, Greece. The event was organized by the LifeWatch ERIC Infrastructure with the aim of tackling the Triple Planetary Crisis (climate change, biodiversity loss, and pollution) through eScience and European Research Infrastructures (RIs). With almost 200 registered participants, the conference discussed “how cutting-edge eScience and European Research Infrastructures can work together to develop innovative solutions for a sustainable future.”

Hosted by the Hellenic Centre for Marine Research, BEeS convened 193 registrants, featured 59 presentations, 36 posters, and provided 12 training sessions, highlighting the vital role of technology, data, and collaborative efforts in confronting global environmental challenges.

Exterior view of the Greek Centre for Marine Research, featuring large windows and a shaded entrance under a blue sky.
A woman in a brown dress and a man in a maroon shirt approach a LifeWatch ERIC banner, entering a building in bright sunlight.

On the first day, a closed-door meeting was held with the aim of adopting a Declaration of Intent (the Crete Declaration) between the involved RIs, e-infrastructures, EU-relevant projects, and Pensoft, as a scientific publisher. The objective was to advance the One Health approach—a strategy that optimizes the health of people, animals, and ecosystems. The Declaration outlines four key strategic commitments:

  • strengthening strategic collaboration
  • advancing data integration and FAIR (Findable, Accessible, Interoperable, Reusable) principles
  • supporting Open Science Ecosystems
  • informing policy and practice

Christos Arvanitidis, the president of LifeWatch ERIC, came to the Pensoft stand to meet with our staff and discuss our agenda.

Two men stand behind an exhibition table filled with brochures and materials for biodiversity science, showcasing several organizations and journals.

Pensoft was also invited to present the outcomes of the BiCIKL project, on which we partnered with LifeWatch ERIC, as part of the Mapping Life on Planet Earth: Biogeography in a Changing World session.

Teodor Georgiev, Chief Technology Officer of Pensoft, delivered the presentation, titled The BiCIKL project traverses obstacles to FAIR and linked biodiversity data usage.

The BiCIKL project, which concluded on 30 April 2024, aims to catalyse the culture change in the way biodiversity data are identified, linked, integrated and re-used across the research lifecycle. Key outcomesinclude the creation of uni- and bi-directional links between biodiversity RIs, the establishment of best practices for Persistent Identifiers (PIDs), recommendations for interoperability between RIs, and the development of automated tools and workflows for published data liberation and FAIR-isation. The presentation also introduced the Biodiversity Knowledge Hub, a one-stop portal for understanding the complex, but increasingly interconnected landscape of biodiversity RIs.

Georgiev also delivered a poster presentation, discussing SOLO: a collaborative open-review and publishing platform supporting the EU Soil Mission.

SOLO, a Horizon Europe project in which Pensoft is involved, aims to identify current knowledge gaps, drivers, bottlenecks, and novel research and innovation approaches to be considered in the European Soil Mission research and innovation roadmap. Hosted on Pensoft’s ARPHA publishing platform and integrating the ARPHA Writing Tool, SOLO engages researchers, practitioners, citizens and other stakeholders in the development and review of ‘living’ open-access documents supporting the EU Mission “A Soil Deal for Europe.” Pensoft’s contribution to SOLO encompasses communication, dissemination, data management, and the crucial development of the platform itself.

Pensoft joins EU-funded project SOLO, supporting the EU Mission “A Soil Deal for Europe”

Fifteen research infrastructures and 15 projects were officially represented at BEes, including two other Horizon Europe projects where Pensoft is a partner: ANERIS, which focuses on scientific tools and methods for marine life-sensing and monitoring, and BMD, which offers a single access point to high-throughput biodiversity monitoring tools.

Berta Companys of the Spanish National Research Council introduced ANERIS with an insightful presentation on the project’s innovative technologies, workflow, and overall approach. Her talk highlighted the key challenges connected to marine biodiversity and monitoring sea and ocean ecosystems that ANERIS is tackling and outlined the solutions the project is developing to address them, such as the implementation of Operational Marine Biology (OMB) data products.

A speaker gestures behind a transparent podium adorned with a ship logo, in a conference setting.

BMD was represented by coordinator Niels Raes of Naturalis Biodiversity Center.

An exhibition booth displays various informational materials related to biodiversity, flanked by two attendees.

The conference facilitated valuable networking opportunities, meeting us with old friends but also giving us a chance to discuss potential future collaborations. Pensoft engaged with partners from other European Research Infrastructures, sharing a dedication to collaborative research and the development of open-access resources addressing global environmental challenges.