Home » Database development » Meetings »
2014-01-13 planning conference call¶
intro¶
Brian: needed meeting b/c a lot going on w/ BIEN and wanted to touch base
hear from each person if still interested in participating in BIEN, and in what capacity
whether Brad is interested in co-leading funding efforts?
need committee to oversee/guide publicly releasing BIEN data
collaboration w/ other groups, e.g. sDiv
future of BIEN: global?
currently, don't have funding for regular, large meeting
need other way to touch base, esp. w/ BIEN3 coming available soon
update on BIEN3¶
Martha: spot-checking has taken much longer than anticipated
next, need to do quantitative validations
need to get it finished in January
milestone rather than release
Brad: quantitative validations are the important next step
could not release data until pass quantitative validations
need to do them to ensure we're not missing data
Martha: in March, Brad's funded time with us ends Brian: firm deadline in March
Brad: may involve creating aggregations for people's analyses
Brian: send around a query to see what people would like to see in denormalized view
iPlant September virtual event¶
Martha: virtual event to open up BIEN3 to the public
use social media, have virtual event
invite the public to come in and familiarize them with a dataset and tools available to use the data
follow-up events for public to try to use the data
"idea markets"
advertise event at ESA conference
recently did workshop
needs to be something the BIEN group is happy with
Brian: need to plan range modeling into workflow
first need to get BIEN3 up and running
BIEN3 questions¶
Brian M: can we do abundance values?¶
Aaron: yes, we can calculate these as derived values
iPlant update¶
Martha: iPlant fiscal year starts in September
budget goes through September
iPlant wants to wind down salary support of various groups
Brian: need to actively apply for additional sources of funding if we want to continue
Martha: funding for Brad is only through March at half-time
putting a workflow in place
funding for Aaron is through August
Bob: no likelihood of funding past August?
Martha: there would have to be discussion, much sooner than summer, if want to consider having additional salary support for people in BIEN working group
public release of BIEN2 & 3 data/range maps¶
Brian: clear overview of BIEN release on BIEN website
soon running into promised delivery dates of what we can make available
logistics of how to serve data
have been in discussions with TRY trait group
first make trait data available?
website or iPlant?
any mechanism w/in iPlant by which different parts of BIEN could be made publicly available?
Martha: this is on iPlant's data management plan
iPlant host/mirror for full normalized DB
also serve out denormalized view
should plan on doing some things in January
Bob: concerned about public release of BIEN2 considering it's flawed
Brian: wouldn't say that it's flawed
Bob: when will we have the next set of range maps
Brian: Brian M interested in rerunning the range maps
Naia: working on range maps paper
Brian: @Bob: have fairly large phylogeny to work with
have some historical legacy
availability of BIEN3 data
Bob: make sure people can get at the legacy data
but make sure it's replaced by another product
Brad: once have BIEN3, doubt anyone will be using BIEN2
created BIEN3 to fix problems w/ range maps
problem is personnel and funding
logical next step is to regenerate range maps from data
Brian: talk w/ Brian M about rerunning the range maps
schedule time with TACC to rerun them
Martha: they reran independently
Longhorn machine has been reworked, will be easier b/c don't have 24-hour time limit
when John is going to dedicate time to that
can always run on another supercomputer, that's not an issue
Brian: anyone interested in being part of a release group?
Cyrille: interested in being part of trait data group
Brian M: also
will arrange time to discuss this
collaborations w/ other groups¶
sPlot¶
Brian: sPlot/sDiv
Brody: sPlot founded back in March
focused study of plant traits along gradients
goal is to cover all major biomes(?)
ended up following TRY model for contributions
whole set of steering committee documents
discussions of how sPlot would fit together with BIEN
do a vegetation plot extract from our DB to send to sPlot
sPlot taking longer to develop than they hoped
have postdoc and tech staff working on it
having trouble creating DB structure
some resistance to incorporating BIEN DB structure
want sPlot DB to fit into their phylogenetic system
Bob: a lot of overlaps, should have some communication with them
draft MOU that Helga sent us
not sure if we ever acted on it, perhaps we should
mostly coordinated w/ European data structure
beneficial to reopen conversations with key players
once Mark gets back from meeting next week, talk w/ Helga, Martin, Juergen to see where they are & how to collaborate
would be shocked if they were doing individual stems
most of their data is releve style/percent cover
Brian: developing more robust DB w/ all aspects of plot data, or just summary info?
they really only want from us the summary info (biomass, etc.)
Brad: not sure how a stems plot would transfer to s.th. which uses cover as the aggregator
Brian: they have contacts in Canada who are sending them plot data, but are extracting just the summary info
TRY¶
Cyrille: have more data in BIEN than in TRY
use TRY data in BIEN
TRY moving towards open access: requiring contributor to make their data public
short-term: web link to TRY data
Brian: has been discussion about whether to make TRY data public
Cyrille: not allowed to _
Ben: 2nd collaboration w/ reusing traits data
Nathan: would be very interested in being involved w/ making all of this available
Brian: Barbara at other meeting, said she would likely be running late
UKansas¶
Brian
goal was to create botannical data network for Americas & calculate range maps
they were not familiar with the BIEN group, surprised at how much progress we had made
still a vast network of potential data collaborators, scientists who would love to be involved in a larger Latin American-inclusive data network
a lot of interest in generating predictions for range maps of different species
links to UKansas things at bottom of Google doc
many possibilities for expanding Latin American network in BIEN
Brian: Peter J: ?
Brian: any additional thoughts
Martha: people should unmute themselves and say "no comment"
it was Naia who fell off the call
BIEN diversity app¶
Brian: simple, free app
user's location -> download species list
use original diversity grid created from last BIEN meeting
update that and make it more finely-grained?
small amt of College of Sci funds available for tech development
it's not expensive, just a few thousand $
identifying funding sources
will set up dropbox to put info about sources of funding
have now finalized how to fund this
Greg would like to do this w/in a month
he's keen on getting this done
will send out link to a dropbox
Brody has talked to Greg
Brody: we worked on some of the technical details
optimistic that we can get it done pretty quickly
before anything is officially released, will send out links to trial of app
trial period where everyone [in BIEN?] invited to use it
free app, so anyone can download it
funding sources¶
Brian: Google doc lists several possible funding sources
NSF RCN network: funding for meetings
does not provide funding for past groups, so would have to be new group
NSF officer didn't think that being an ongoing group would be an issue
Martha: can part of RCN be for core group (development), and then another group for community members using the data?
no firm deadline for submission
at this point, more interested in knowing anyone who wants to lead, co-lead
Mark very interested in this
quite a bit of interest in this
identify a timeline for meetings
outline goal proposal
Brody?: mid-August deadline?
[Bob needed to leave]
systematic program for biodiversity collections
a good source of additional funding
NSF international collaborations program
Jens had expressed interest in collaborating
Luc Huffman inst
funds(?) collaboration meetings
potential for funding for specific meetings from Luc Huffman inst
similar to Smith fellows from Nature Conservancy
stakeholder outreach
associated with WWF
several e-mails from Josh w/ suggestions for networks we could partner w/
partners in the Amazon, Amazonian diversity
if interested in bringing in additional group
there is also a July/August submission deadline if we don't meet the January one
Jens: this sounds like a great opportunity
have put together a dropbox for this
IUCN
Luc Huffman inst has developed pretty strong ties w/ IUCN
Peter J (via webex chat): "I am a member of a couple of IUCN groups but the number of people they fund is very low, 8-10"
Ben: @ last BIEN meeting, there was talk of a _ project
Brad: agree, it's a good outreach project
Brian: definitely something we can mention
w/in BIEN2 had _ , do we have this in BIEN3
Brad: something external that would need to be added in creating analyt views
trying to approach USGS Powell Ctr for working group
need USGS employee to sponsor us in our proposal
according to their website
Cyrille: will verify that
very unique poss if decide to collab w/ USGS
meetings in Fort Collins, CO
should look into/pursue, there is strong interest
OCS Costa Rica
funding rate 50-60%
deadline 2/1, doesn't look too onerous
for bringing in more Latin American collabs
a low-hanging fruit, so we should at least try
paper updates¶
Irena
Brian: set up dropbox w/ info for analyses?
Brody: biodiversity patterns
beta turnover
hoping to have update to phylogeny
Brian: network analysis Ben/Naia
Naia: will set up Skype for next week, once have everyone's comments
Brian: PNAS paper
Cyrille: late, Christine working on _
Ben working on revision of manuscript
Ben: also working on revised letter to send to editors
?: diversity hotspot, sampling
Brian: Naia: range controls paper
Naia: will send it out soon, now that have time to work on it again
coming out to Tucson?
Naia: yes, working on visa application
Brian: Ben: community assembly paper
Ben: thank you all for your work, hopefully we'll hear back soon
Jeff: working on the project Brad started: ecoregions
range maps at finer grain
use in simpler analysis
if BIEN3 range maps on horizon, consider waiting, otherwise move forward until have that dataset available for use
Brad: in private sector work, found large-scale mapping of _ across the Americas
good example of use of _ to discover project boundaries
being used as a reference for on-the-ground consulting work
wrap-up¶
Brian: people should send thoughts on Google doc
Brian: move towards a more regular meeting schedule
at least once/month
will organize this
assuming this time works well for most of you, unless hear otherwise
Brian: small BIEN meeting in Tucson on Mo. 2/24
trying to get funding for at least travel
also webex or video conferencing participation
address BIEN3 issues, and research
Files (0)
