Missouri Botanical Garden Open Conference Systems, TDWG 2013 ANNUAL CONFERENCE

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The Earth Microbiome Project: Planetary-scale systems ecology.
Sean Gibbons, Jack Gilbert, Rob Knight, Janet Jansson, Jai Rideout, Antonio Gonzales, Emmanuel Prestat, J Gregory Caporaso

Building: Grand Hotel Mediterraneo
Room: Sala dei Continenti
Date: 2013-11-01 11:11 AM – 11:20 AM
Last modified: 2013-10-07

Abstract


The Earth Microbiome Project (EMP) is a systematic attempt to characterize patterns of global microbial taxonomic and functional diversity, using a set of standardized wet-lab and analytical protocols, including data reporting standards as laid down by the Genomic Standards Consortium’s Minimal Information About Any Sequence (MIxS) format, specifically using the Minimal Information about Marker Gene Sequences (MIMARKS) for data reporting. The EMP faces major challenges for meta-analyses, including the standardization of metadata ontology across extremely different systems, and integration of molecular ecology data (metagenomics, genomics, and amplicon sequencing) into the broader ecological literature, which predominantly focuses on macroorganims. For this, interoperable definitions of ‘species’, ‘diversity’, and ‘function’ are required. Our current focus is on internal ontological consistency, and developing efficient methodologies for extracting the desired metadata information for data provided by collaborators scattered across the world. Future work will address the integration of our standards with other environmental ontologies, such as SWEET, ENVO, or PCO. This work will enhance our capacity to model global biotic and abiotic dynamics, and expand the theoretical framework underlying ecology and evolution.