Informatics systematics
Goal: Landcare Research’s science knowledge, databases and collections, analyses and modelling are readily available and can be used efficiently and effectively, both internally and externally.
Context
Landcare Research is custodian of and curates seven Nationally Significant Databases and Collections – the largest holding for any of the CRIs, and larger than equivalent collections held by museums in New Zealand. The collections and databases cover biological resources (species and ecosystems), soil and land resources, and cultural knowledge. They are used extensively in taxonomic and systematics research and to underpin New Zealand’s biosecurity, biodiversity, export/import trade, and land management, including primary production, conservation and environmental management (i.e. the delivery of our National Outcomes).
Our informatics research is focused on designing information systems that can manage and process complex data and ideas in order to deliver the right knowledge, to the right person, in the right place, time, and form. Informatics can create new value and opportunities by integrating and interpreting data across multiple sources and agencies.
Where appropriate, information from our systematics and land resource Nationally Significant Databases is available online under an open-licensing agreement. Data can be freely used for public good (non-commercial) purposes provided we are acknowledged as the source of data.
We develop new software applications to enhance knowledge transfer and to increase the accessibility and interoperability, nationally and internationally, of data in these databases.