MEDIN Partners Meeting Sept 2010 DASSH – The Archive for Marine Species and Habitats Dan Lear DASSH Project Co-ordinator Marine Biological Association of the UK

MEDIN Partners Meeting Sept 2010 What is DASSH? The UK archive for marine species and habitats data Based at the Marine Biological Association, Plymouth Launched 2005 Accredited MEDIN Biodiversity Data Archive Centre (DAC) Currently ~800,000 records Provides data to the NBN, GBIF and OBIS Provides metadata to MEDIN portal

MEDIN Partners Meeting Sept 2010 What does DASSH do? DASSH: provides a DAC to safeguard marine biodiversity data, makes that data available as a national information resource, creates and hosts metadata for organizations unable to mobilise metadata to the MEDIN Portal, produces and promotes standards for biological data exchange, and works with holders and users of marine biological data to ensure best practice and that the full value is being realized from their data.

MEDIN Partners Meeting Sept 2010 What can the data be used for? Data from DASSH can Support Marine Spatial Planning and Environmental Impact Assessments Provide the evidence base to achieve Good Environmental Status (GES) under the Marine Strategy Framework Directive (MSFD) Assist in meeting the reporting requirements of UK Marine Monitoring and Assessment Strategy, which in turn addresses the reporting for more than 40 national and international obligations (inc OSPAR, WFD and other marine environmental directives).

MEDIN Partners Meeting Sept 2010 Data flow 3 rd party data into DASSH Data reformatting, metadata creation/checking, QA of data

MEDIN Partners Meeting Sept 2010 Submission of data DASSH currently accepts data from 3rd parties in a variety of formats from paper records to complex databases. No barriers to archiving – but the variability in data structures leads to a more costly archiving process.

MEDIN Partners Meeting Sept 2010 Issues Adherence to standards –Older datasets do not adhere to standards and often vary in structure even within organizations. Large volumes of data still inaccessible –Availability of data from academic and commercial sources poor Data ownership issues –Historical and legacy datasets often have unknown provenance, normally due to: Lack of metadata –Many datasets lack metadata, or where metadata does exist it is lacking mandatory elements that are critical to discovery or evaluation of the data

MEDIN Partners Meeting Sept 2010 Submission of data DASSH and MEDIN are producing data specifications for the supply of biological data in a standard format. This will –Simplify the ingestion, archiving, aggregation and re-use of the data –Reduce the costs of archiving Wider adoption of the MEDIN Metadata Discovery Standard is taking place. –Greater ability to discover available data will reduce unnecessary re- surveying

MEDIN Partners Meeting Sept 2010 Submission of metadata MEDIN Discovery Metadata Standard – compliant with UK GEMINI and INSPIRE DASSH have built the MEDIN online tool to simplify the generation and management of metadata –Supports import and export of XML files –Export metadata directly to the MEDIN portal Metadata should be created as close to the source of the data as possible.

MEDIN Partners Meeting Sept 2010 Submission of metadata MEDIN Portal Metadata Open Archives Initiative (OAI) Harvester

MEDIN Partners Meeting Sept 2010 Benefits Single point of access to data, simplifying discovery and reducing costs Contributing to a national resource Ensuring data and metadata complies with UK and international standards Meeting knowledge transfer / dissemination requirements Offsite storage of data for disaster recovery purposes

MEDIN Partners Meeting Sept 2010 Built using PHP, Javascript, OpenLayers & Geoserver Allows the download of data as CSV or KML Access to Data DASSH has developed a web application to query available species data and allow direct download or visualization of the data. Query can be constructed based on species, location or originating organization.

MEDIN Partners Meeting Sept 2010 Access to Data Data is routinely supplied to the National Biodiversity Network, for dissemination through their portal, the NBN Gateway - Data then flows from the NBN to the GBIF and OBIS and EurOBIS portals

MEDIN Partners Meeting Sept 2010 Thank you For more information about DASSH or to provide data to the archive, please contact: Dan Lear

MEDIN Partners Meeting Sept 2010 DASSH Services In addition to the core DAC services that DASSH provides, additional data services can be undertaken

MEDIN Partners Meeting Sept 2010 DASSH Services Data Management Service Data Requests Custom Data Queries Archiving Data Analysis Metadata and Data Standards Coordination MEDIN Compliance

MEDIN Partners Meeting Sept 2010 DASSH Web site (

MEDIN Partners Meeting Sept 2010 Data Flow

MEDIN Partners Meeting Sept 2010 Data acquisition - priorities Priority will be given to the acquisition of: long-term (time-series) data; natural resource surveys (not currently managed or archived); Environmental Assessment (EA) survey data, especially within the commercial sector; Any ‘at risk’ data/images within the categories outlined above, and Any ‘recent’ (last 3 years) datasets within the categories outlined above.

MEDIN Partners Meeting Sept 2010 Data acquisition – so far Over 800,000 species records from in excess of 630 surveys

MEDIN Partners Meeting Sept 2010 Using DASSH Data

MEDIN Partners Meeting Sept 2010 Using DASSH Data Spread of Crepidula fornicata (Slipper limpet) from Crepidula fornicata at Oreston Spit. Image: Keith Hiscock

MEDIN Partners Meeting Sept 2010 Developing Standards Working with MEDIN and other key partners DASSH has helped to develop the MEDIN Discovery Metadata standard, associated XML schema and documentation. DASSH is also working with CCW and MEDIN to develop standard methodologies and formats for the collection and storage of biological data. Developed a Metadata Creation Tool to generate MEDIN Discovery Standard complaint metadata.

MEDIN Partners Meeting Sept 2010 Metadata creation tool Allows the easy capture of MEDIN Discovery Metadata through a web interface Ingest and export of XML Checks validity of XML against Schematron Web Service Auto-capture of bounding box and associated spatial extents

MEDIN Partners Meeting Sept 2010 Submitting data to DASSH DASSH currently accepts data from 3 rd parties in a variety of formats from paper records to complex databases. No barriers to archiving – but the more complex the data structure the more costly the archiving process. MEDIN Data Specifications are being finalised. Wide adoption will greatly reduce the cost of archiving.

MEDIN Partners Meeting Sept 2010 Data flow Consultancies Public NGO’s Statutory agencies Academia MEDIN Portal Metadata Data NBN Gateway GBIF & OBIS DASSH OAI Provider