PORBIOTA - Portuguese E-Infrastructure for Information and Research on Biodiversity

PORBIOTA is the Portuguese distributed e-infrastructure targeted at storing, organizing and disseminating biodiversity and environmental data, providing a platform that connects academia, the public administration and the civil society. Fostering a national agenda for biodiversity and ecosystems research, making available high-quality knowledge needed to meet societal challenges regarding environmental protection and sustainability. PORBIOTA provides site-based platforms for research and monitoring of long term ecological (LTER) and environmental (ICOS) processes. PORBIOTA manages LIFEWATCH Portugal as the national node of LIFEWATCH-ERIC, the e-Science European infrastructure for biodiversity and ecosystem research, an ESFRI landmark.

PORBIOTA connects research institutions working in biodiversity: (CIBIO-InBIO (ICETA-UP), cE3c (FCUL, ULisboa), LEAF and CEF (ISA, ULisboa), CESAM (UAveiro), MARE (UCoimbra), IPVC; the national governmental agency responsible for biodiversity conservation (ICNF), the Portuguese node GBIF, the Portuguese Ecological Society (SPECO) and the natural history museums: MHNC (UPorto), MC (UCoimbra), MUHNAC (ULisboa). PORBIOTA is listed in the Portuguese Roadmap of Research Infrastructures of Strategic Interest (RNIE), which includes LTER Portugal, ICOS Portugal and AzoresBioportal, which together hold the most comprehensive information on Portuguese biodiversity and ecosystem functioning.

To achieve general aims and specific goals for the implementation of the e-infrastructure, PORBIOTA project was organized in ten work packages (WPs) structured according to:

- Data source and infrastructure management (WP1-2 and WP3);
- Operation and data science (WP6 and WP7-8);
- E-Infrastructure (WP4-5 and WP6, WP8);
- Policy and communication management (WP9-WP10).

The main specific goals are:
I. To promote the identification, registry, mobilization and organization of biodiversity and environmental data available.
ii. To establish a national monitoring system for genetic, systems and ecosystem diversity and environmental quality, including a network of long term ecological research sites (LTER) and a network of observation stations on ecosystem-atmosphere interaction (ICOS).
iii. To establish data models and standardized schema for data storage, retrieval, and exchange, thereby operationalizing the use and dissemination of data obtained from extant databases, contributing to provide the capacity for handling vast amounts of data and to implement complex computational routines, developing new cost-effective technological tools for biodiversity and environmental data collection.
iv. The use of the e-infrastructure, including the data and analytic tools, thereby increasing the capacity of PORBIOTA to its application in policy support and management and in dissemination, outreach and training.
vi. To increase collaboration and enhance the role of Portugal in research international infrastructures and networks, particularly with those addressing similar themes such as LIFEWATCH, LTER-Europe, ICOS, GBIF and DISSCo.