GBIF Backbone Taxonomy

.The GBIF Backbone Taxonomy is a single, synthetic management classification with the goal of covering all names GBIF is dealing with. It's the taxonomic backbone that allows GBIF to integrate name based information from different resources, no matter if these are occurrence datasets, species pages, names from nomenclators or external sources like EOL, Genbank or IUCN. This backbone allows taxonomic search, browse and reporting operations across all those resources in a consistent way and to provide means to crosswalk names from one source to another.

It is updated regulary through an automated process in which the Catalogue of Life acts as a starting point also providing the complete higher classification above families. Additional scientific names only found in other authoritative nomenclatural and taxonomic datasets are then merged into the tree, thus extending the original catalogue and broadening the backbones name coverage. The GBIF Backbone taxonomy also includes identifiers for Operational Taxonomic Units (OTUs) drawn from the barcoding resources iBOL and UNITE.

International Barcode of Life project (iBOL), Barcode Index Numbers (BINs). BINs are connected to a taxon name and its classification by taking into account all names applied to the BIN and picking names with at least 80% consensus. If there is no consensus of name at the species level, the selection process is repeated moving up the major Linnaean ranks until consensus is achieved.

UNITE - Unified system for the DNA based fungal species, Species Hypotheses (SHs). SHs are connected to a taxon name and its classification based on the determination of the RefS (reference sequence) if present or the RepS (representative sequence). In the latter case, if there is no match in the UNITE taxonomy, the lowest rank with 100% consensus within the SH will be used.

The GBIF Backbone Taxonomy is available for download at http://rs.gbif.org/datasets/backbone/ in different formats together with an archive of all previous versions.

The following sources have been used to assemble the GBIF backbone with number of names given in brackets:

• Catalogue of Life (3824512)

• International Barcode of Life project (iBOL), Barcode Index Numbers (483386)

• World Register of Marine Species (303653)

• The Plant List with literature (233404)

• GBIF Type Specimen Names (222609)

• The Interim Register of Marine and Nonmarine Genera (212429)

• UNITE - Unified system for the DNA based fungal species linked to the classification (160302)

• The Paleobiology Database (151689)

• Index Fungorum (114301)

• TAXREF (111507)

• Integrated Taxonomic Information System (ITIS (93108)

• International Plant Names Index (76247)

• Fauna Europaea (55318)

• ZooBank (55311)

• Plazi treatments (48744)

• Dyntaxa. Svensk taxonomisk databas (37163)

• Artsnavnebasen (25877)

• GRIN Taxonomy (24573)

• Afromoths, online database of Afrotropical moth species (Lepidoptera (22951)

• Brazilian Flora 2020 project - Projeto Flora do Brasil 2020 (19032)

• The National Checklist of Taiwan (16339)

• Fauna Europaea - Lepidoptera (12339)

• DiversityTaxonNames lists (10896)

• Checklist Dutch Species Register - Nederlands Soortenregister (9112)

• Prokaryotic Nomenclature Up-to-date (6575)

• ICTV Master Species List 2019 v2 (5677)

• Catalogue of Afrotropical Bees (4597)

• Database of Vascular Plants of Canada (VASCAN (3993)

• Official Lists and Indexes of Names in Zoology (3761)

• The Clements Checklist (3630)

• Catalogue of Tenebrionidae (Coleoptera) of North America (3216)

• A list of the terrestrial fungi, flora and fauna of Madeira and Selvagens archipelagos (1706)

• Orthoptera Species File (1543)

• Checklist of Beetles (Coleoptera) of Canada and Alaska. Second Edition (1421)

• International Cichorieae Network (ICN): Cichorieae Portal (1377)

• Aphid Species File (1085)

• Lygaeoidea Species File (575)

• ION Taxonomic Hierarchy (562)

• Psocodea Species File (476)

• Mantodea Species File (396)

• GBIF Algae Classification (289)

• Coreoidea Species File (263)

• Cockroach Species File (215)

• Phasmida Species File (172)

• Plecoptera Species File (112)

• Dermaptera Species File (112)

• GBIF Backbone Patch (93)

• Mammal Species of the World (90)

• Grylloblattodea Species File (44)

• True Fruit Flies (Diptera, Tephritidae) of the Afrotropical Region (36)

• Species named after famous people (34)

• Catalogue of the type specimens of Bufonidae and Megophryidae from research collections of the Zoological Institute, Russian Academy of Sciences (24)

• Embioptera Species File (17)

• Coleorrhyncha Species File (16)

• Chrysididae Species File (14)

• Asiloid Flies: new taxa of Diptera: Apioceridae, Asilidae, and Mydidae (10)

• Backbone Family Classification Patch (6)

• GBIF Backbone Taxonomy (2)

• Mantophasmatodea Species File (1)