Defining linkages between the GSC and NSF's LTER program: how the Ecological Metadata Language (EML) relates to GCDML and other outcomes.
The Genomic Standards Consortium (GSC) invited a representative of the Long-Term Ecological Research (LTER) to its fifth workshop to present the Ecological Metadata Language (EML) metadata standard and its relationship to the Minimum Information about a Genome/Metagenome Sequence (MIGS/MIMS) and its implementation, the Genomic Contextual Data Markup Language (GCDML). The LTER is one of the top National Science Foundation (NSF) programs in biology since 1980, representing diverse ecosystems and creating long-term, interdisciplinary research, synthesis of information, and theory. The adoption of EML as the LTER network standard has been key to build network synthesis architectures based on high-quality standardized metadata. EML is the NSF-recognized metadata standard for LTER, and EML is a criteria used to review the LTER program progress. At the workshop, a potential crosswalk between the GCDML and EML was explored. Also, collaboration between the LTER and GSC developers was proposed to join efforts toward a common metadata cataloging designer's tool. The community adoption success of a metadata standard depends, among other factors, on the tools and trainings developed to use the standard. LTER's experience in embracing EML may help GSC to achieve similar success. A possible collaboration between LTER and GSC to provide training opportunities for GCDML and the associated tools is being explored. Finally, LTER is investigating EML enhancements to better accommodate genomics data, possibly integrating the GCDML schema into EML. All these action items have been accepted by the LTER contingent, and further collaboration between the GSC and LTER is expected.
Gil
Inigo San
IS
Department of Biology, LTER Network Office, University of New Mexico, Albuquerque, New Mexico 87131, USA. isangil@lternet.edu
Sheldon
Wade
W
Schmidt
Tom
T
Servilla
Mark
M
Aguilar
Raul
R
Gries
Corinna
C
Gray
Tanya
T
Field
Dawn
D
Cole
James
J
Pan
Jerry Yun
JY
Palanisamy
Giri
G
Henshaw
Donald
D
O'Brien
Margaret
M
Kinkel
Linda
L
McMahon
Katherine
K
Kottmann
Renzo
R
Amaral-Zettler
Linda
L
Hobbie
John
J
Goldstein
Philip
P
Guralnick
Robert P
RP
Brunt
James
J
Michener
William K
WK
D030541:Databases, Genetic; D016678:Genome; D011381:Programming Languages