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In an effort to characterise the various dimensions of activity within the biodiversity informatics landscape, we developed a framework to survey these dimensions for ten major organisations*1 relative to both their current activities and long-term strategic ambitions. This survey assessed the contact between these infrastructure organisations by capturing the breadth of activities for each infrastructure across five categories (data, standards, software, hardware and policy), for nine types of data (specimens, collection descriptions, opportunistic observations, systematic observations, taxonomies, traits, geological data, molecular data, and literature), and for seven phases of activity (creation, aggregation, access, annotation, interlinkage, analysis, and synthesis). This generated a dataset of 6,300 verified observations, which have been scored and validated by leading members of each infrastructure organisation. In this analysis of the resulting data, we address a set of high-level questions about the overall biodiversity informatics landscape, looking at the greatest gaps, overlap and possible rate-limiting steps. Across the infrastructure organisations, we also explore how far each is in relation to achieving its ambitions and the extent of its niche relative to other organisations. Our results show that when viewed by scope, most infrastructures occupy a relatively narrow niche in the overall landscape of activity, with the notable exception of the Global Biodiversity Information Facility (GBIF) and possibly LifeWatch. Niches associated with molecular data and biological taxonomy are very well filled, suggesting there is still considerable room for growth in other areas, with the Distributed System of Scientific Collections (DiSSCo) and the Integrated European Long-Term Ecosystem Research Infrastructure (eLTER RI) showing the highest levels of difference between their current activities and stated ambitions, potentially reflecting the relative youth of these organisations. iNaturalist, the Biodiversity Heritage Library and Catalogue of Life all occupy narrow and tightly circumscribed niches. These organisations are also amongst the closest to achieving their stated ambitions within their respective areas of activity. The largest gaps in infrastructure activity relate to the development of hardware and standards, with many gaps set to be addressed if the stated ambitions of those surveyed come to fruition. Nevertheless, some gaps persist, outlining a potential role for this survey as a planning tool to help coordinate and align investment in future biodiversity informatics activities. GBIF and LifeWatch are the two infrastructures where there is the most similarity in ambition with DiSSCo, with the greatest overlap concentrated on activities related to data/content, specimen data and their shared ambition to interlink information. While overlap appears intense, the analysis is limited by the resolution of the survey framework and ignores existing collaborations between infrastructures. In addition to presenting the results of this survey, we outline our plans to publish this work and a proposal to develop the methodology as an interactive web-based tool. This would allow other projects and infrastructures to self-score their activities and visualise their niche within the current landscape, encouraging better global alignment of activities. For example, our results should make it easier for initiatives to strengthen collaboration and differentiate work when their activities overlap. Likewise, this approach would be useful for funding agencies when targeting gaps in the informatics landscape or increasing the technical maturity of certain critical activities, e.g., to improve immature data standards. While no framework is perfect, we hope to encourage a dialogue on the potential for taking an algorithmic approach to community alignment and see this as a means of strengthening community cooperation when addressing problems that require global cooperation.

The collections policy of the Finnish Museum of Natural History Luomus is hierarchically structured. The general collections policy defines the overall principles and guidelines. The sub-collections policies, such as the Living collections policy, comply with and apply the general collections policy and specify its guidelines and instructions, taking the special nature of the sub-collections into account. The living plant collections policy guides the care of the collections in the botanic gardens and the seed bank, excluding DNA and tissue samples which are covered by a separate genomic resources policy. The purpose of the collections policy is to help guide the care of the garden collections and the processing of information relating to the collections, thereby providing the basis for developing the botanic gardens. Non

The herbarium collections are sub-collections of the Finnish Museum of Natural History Luomus that manages national natural history collections, as referred to in the Universities Act. The general collections policy defines the overall principles and guidelines concerning the collections practices. The sub-collections policies specify its guidelines and instructions, considering the special nature of the sub-collections. The policy for the botanical and mycological herbarium collections guides the activities related to all botanical, mycological and phycological collections in herbaria, hence excluding digital collections, DNA and tissue samples as well as living collections, which have separate policies. The herbarium collections policy defines and outlines the purpose of the collections as is to accrue and preserve natural specimens representing biodiversity for research and university-level teaching. The policy defines the objectives and content of related activities, the division of responsibilities for the administration and care of the collections within the organisation, and the general principles and practices for the acquisition, preservation, availability and use of the collections. Non

As part of its quality management and goal-driven strategic development, the Finnish Museum of Natural History Luomus drafts policy documents to guide its operational sectors. The purpose of such policies is to define the content and procedures of the Museum’s activities. They answer the questions “what”, “why”, “who” and “for whom” about the activities they discuss, which is to say that they define and delimit the scope of the operational sector, provide the operations with a purpose and determine their content, describe the allocation of responsibilities in the sector under the Luomus organisation and identify the target groups. The policies provide general objectives and thus form the basis for target programmes and any action plans which in turn answer the question “How can we reach the designated goals?”. Policies are not tied to a schedule, unlike target programmes, even though they must be dynamic and updated periodically to better serve the organisation. The core activities at Luomus are: (1) maintenance of the scientific collections, (2) research and (3) expert services. The General Collections Policy sets guidelines for the maintenance of the scientific collections based on the mission of the University of Helsinki and Luomus Non

SummaryBiodiversity is eroding at unprecedented rates due to human activity1. Species’ trajectories towards extinction are shaped by multiple factors, including life-history traits2 as well as human pressures3. Previous studies linking these factors to extinction risk have been narrow in their taxonomic and geographic scope4, thus limiting the ability for identifying global predictors. We studied the relation between 12 traits and the extinction risk of almost 900 species representing 15 groups across the tree of life (vertebrates, invertebrates and plants) at a global scale. We show that threatened species share narrow habitat breadth, poor dispersal ability, low fecundity, small altitudinal range, and are affected by a large human footprint. Other traits either show contrasting responses among groups (body size, offspring size, and change in human footprint), or relations were found for only a limited number of taxa (generation length, diet breadth, microhabitat). Our study suggests that in the absence of data on the precise distribution and population trends of species, traits can be used as predictors of extinction risk and thus help guide future research, monitoring and conservation efforts.

The service model of the Global Biodiversity Information Facility (GBIF) is being implemented in an increasing number of national biodiversity (BD) data services. While GBIF already shares >109 data points, national initiatives are an essential component: increase in GBIF-mediated data relies on national data mobilisation and GBIF is not optimised to support local use. The Finnish Biodiversity Information Facility (FinBIF), initiated in 2012 and operational since late 2016, is one of the more recent examples of national BD research infrastructures (RIs) – and arguably among the most comprehensive. Here, we describe FinBIF’s development and service integration, and provide a model approach for the construction of all-inclusive national BD RIs. FinBIF integrates a wide array of BD RI approaches under the same umbrella. These include large-scale and multi-technology digitisation of natural history collections; building a national DNA barcode reference library and linking it to species occurrence data; citizen science platforms enabling recording, managing and sharing of observation data; management and sharing of restricted data among authorities; community-driven species identification support; an e-learning environment for species identification; and IUCN Red Listing (Fig. 1). FinBIF’s aims are to accelerate digitisation, mobilisation, and distribution of biodiversity data and to boost their use in research and education, environmental administration, and the private sector. The core functionalities of FinBIF were built in a 3.5-year project (01/2015–06/2018) by a consortium of four university-based natural history collection facilities led by the Finnish Museum of Natural History Luomus. Close to 30% of the total funding was granted through the Finnish Research Infrastructures programme (FIRI) governed by the national research council and based on scientific excellence. Government funds for productivity enhancement in state administration covered c.40 % of the development and the rest was self-financed by the implementing consortium of organisations that have both a research and an education mission. The cross-sectoral scope of FinBIF has led to rapid uptake and a broad user base of its functionalities and services. Not only researchers but also administrative authorities, various enterprises and a large number of private citizens show a significant interest in the RI (Table 1). FinBIF is now in its second construction cycle (2019–2022), funded through the FIRI programme and, thus, focused on researcher services. The work programme includes integration of tools for data management in ecological restoration and e-Lab tools for spatial analyses, morphometric analysis of 3D images, species identification from sound recordings, and metagenomics analyses.

The Finnish Red Lists from 2000 and 2010 were used to calculate for the first time the national Red List Index for the order Lepidoptera and different Lepidoptera families with data from 2245 species. We grouped species according to their primary habitats and analysed each habitat's RLI as well. The overall RLI was significantly negative, reflecting the worsening of the group as a whole in the country. A significant negative trend was found for families Tortricidae, Gelechiidae and Hesperiidae and for coastal habitats. We also report that 76 Lepidoptera species newly established a population in Finland between 2000 and 2010, probably expanding northwards driven by climate warming.

Our goal was to infer the phylogenetic relationships and historical biogeography of the genusWe obtained sequence data for five chloroplast markers from 214 species ofWe found that 22 of 27 accessions of sub-Saharan AfricanThe majority of sub-Saharan African

Ferns are the second largest group of vascular land plants after the angiosperms, but remain chronically underrepresented in studies of plant phylogeny, biogeography, physiology, and genomics. The genus Dryopteris, the woodferns, is a large group with a worldwide distribution, and recent research has made it one of the better understood fern genera and a potential model for understanding many aspects of fern biology and evolution. Here we review historical and current understanding of the genus, and outline promising avenues of future research in ferns for which Dryopteris is an ideal study system, particularly for research on polyploid complexes, biogeographic distributions, and physiological ecology.

Traditionally, ecologists and taxonomists have conducted mostly separated research. Ecologists have been using the well-known species groups as their model organisms for practical reasons, whereas taxonomists have focused on poorly known species groups. Extensive collaboration between these research fields has unfortunately been a rarity. We argue that increased collaboration between ecologists and taxonomists yields benefits through several pathways. Firstly, it improves the scientific quality of both disciplines through deeper insight on the study organisms and increased feasibility of the collected data. Secondly, it improves the prospects of the scientists involved and opens up potential funding sources, helping to solve the taxonomic impediment. Finally, improved collaboration could balance ecological research towards more species-rich, functionally important groups. This would increase the quality and effectiveness of nature conservation and management plans positively affecting the sustainability of environmental policy making. These obvious benefits should be swiftly acknowledged by research institutions, science leaders and funding bodies. They should actively promote for strong collaborative efforts from the present and recruited staff representing both disciplines.

The taxonomic knowledge gap and lack of knowledge on species-level diversity has been a global concern within conservation biology through the recent two decades. As a national response, Finland has funded a Research Program of Poorly Known and Threatened Forest Species from the year 2003. The program is an essential part of the knowledge base applied in Finnish forest policy. The present paper evaluates the outcomes of the program, covering scientific publication, training, taxonomic coverage, increased knowledge on boreal forest biodiversity and awareness rising. The ongoing program has been funded by 6.5 million Euros to date including 59 projects. The program has produced 19 master’s theses and six doctoral theses. Due to their expertise the graduated biologists have been employed in environmental administration or become researchers. The program has produced 163 refereed scientific articles, 104 of which are recognized by the Web of Science; with an average impact factor of 1.81. The results of the program include 15 genera and 348 species new to science, and 60 genera and 1,664 species to Finland’s list of known species. Due to new knowledge gathered in the program 3,000–4,000 species could be included in the most recent National Red List assessment. The publishing of identification books on local language has proved as the most effective way of advancing general species knowledge among the public and end-users. The high number of new species to science from a biodiversity-poor boreal country describes the scale of the huge work still be done in describing the global species-level diversity. The program has achieved its goals in many ways, but the program leaves out a large part of the species that do not occur in forest biotopes. Moreover, the funding has decreased through the years despite the international goal of halting the world’s biodiversity loss has not been met.

The International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) Red List Index (RLI) is recognized as one of the key indicators of trends in the status of species. The red-list assessment done by Finnish authorities of species in Finland is taxonomically one of the most extensive national assessments. We used the Finnish Red Lists from 2000 and 2010 to calculate for the first time the national RLIs for 11 taxonomic groups at different trophic levels and with different life cycles. The red-list index is calculated on the basis of changes in red-list categories and indicates trends in the status of biological diversity of sets of species. The RLI value ranges from 0 to 1. The lower the value the faster the set of species is heading toward extinction. If the value is 1, all species in the set are least concern and if the value is 0, all species are (regionally) extinct. The overall RLI of Finnish species decreased. This means that, in Finland, these taxonomic groups were heading toward extinction faster in 2010 than in 2000. Of the analyzed groups of organisms, RLIs of 5 decreased and RLIs of 6 increased. At the national level, the RLIs and status trends varied markedly between species groups. Thus, we concluded that generalizations on the basis of RLIs of a few taxa only may yield a biased view of ongoing trends in the status of biological diversity at the species level. In addition, one overall RLI that includes many different species groups may also be misleading if variation in RLI among species groups is not considered and if RLI values are not presented separately for each group. Aplicacion del Indice de la Lista Roja a Nivel Nacional para Grupos de Especies Multiples Resumen El Indice de la Lista Roja (ILR) de la Union Internacional para la Conservacion de la Naturaleza (IUCN) es reconocido como uno de los indicadores clave de las tendencias en el estatus de las especies. La evaluacion de lista roja realizada por autoridades finlandesas con las especies en Finlandia es, taxonomicamente, una de las evaluaciones nacionales mas extensivas. Utilizamos las Listas Rojas Finlandesas de 2000 a 2010 para calcular, por primera vez, los ILR nacionales para 11 grupos taxonomicos en diferentes niveles troficos y con ciclos de vida diferentes. El indice de la lista roja se calcula con base en los cambios en las categorias de la lista roja e indica las tendencias en el estatus de biodiversidad de conjuntos de especies. El valor de ILR varia entre 0 y 1. A menor valor, mayor la velocidad con que el conjunto de especies va hacia la extincion. Si el valor es 1, todas las especies en el conjunto son de menor preocupacion y si el valor es 0, todas las especies estan extintas (regionalmente). El ILR general de especies finlandesas decrecio. Esto significa que, en Finlandia, estos grupos taxonomicos van rumbo a la extincion mas rapido en 2010 que en 2000. De los grupos de organismos analizados, los ILR de 5 disminuyeron y los ILR de 6 incrementaron. A nivel nacional, los ILR y las tendencias de estatus variaron marcadamente entre especies y grupos. Por lo tanto, concluimos que las generalizaciones con base en los ILR de solo unos cuantos taxa puede producir una vision sesgada de las tendencias en el estatus de la biodiversidad a nivel de especies. Adicionalmente, un ILR total que incluye muchos grupos diferentes de especies tambien puede ser enganoso si la variacion del ILR entre grupos de especies no es considerada y si los valores de ILR so se presentan por separado para cada grupo.

To test earlier hypotheses on the evolutionary origins of European polyploid Dryopteris, their phylogenetic rela- tionships are investigated using nuclear pgiC and plastid trnL-F sequence data. The nuclear pgiC region is for the first time used successfully in phylogenetic analyses of ferns, and is shown to provide appropriate variability to address species-level questions in Dryopteris. The trnL-F dataset is used to infer maternal relationships for the allopolyploid species and provides strong support for some of the smaller clades resolved by pgiC. Allopolyploid origins of Dryopteris carthusiana, D. cristata, and D. guanchica are supported and some, but not all, progenitors are indicated by the analyses. The results are in disagreement with the "D. semicristata" hypothesis proposed by several authors. The allopolyploid origin of D. crispifolia remained unresolved and allopolyploid origins of D. dilatata and D. filix-mas were unsupported. This study provides the first insight in the molecular phylogeny of the diploid D. fragrans, which shows major genetic variation within the only European population of the species.

The phylogenetic relationships of liverworts were reconstructed using the sequence data of four genome regions including rbcL, rps4 and trnL-F of the chloroplast and 26S large subunit ribosomal rRNA gene of the nucleus, and 90 characters of morphological, ultrastructural and developmental aspects. The taxa sampled consisted of 159 species including 135 liverworts (108 genera, 54 families and 29 suborders), 13 mosses, two hornworts, seven vascular plants and two charophyte algae. Analyses based on maximum parsimony using both direct optimization (POY) and static alignment (NONA), as well as Bayesian inference (MrBayes) were done. All the data sets were analyzed simultaneously. Our study confirms that liverworts compose a monophyletic group which consists of three classes. The class Treubiopsida including both Treubia and Haplomitrium is resolved as the earliest diverging liverwort lineage. Blasia and the complex thalloids are assigned to the Marchantiopsida, under which Blasiidae and Marchantiidae are divided. Marchantiidae include Sphaerocarpales and Marchantiales. The simple thalloid and leafy liverworts form the Jungermanniopsida, which is further divided to subclasses Pelliidae subclassis nov., Metzgeriidae and Jungermanniidae. Metzgeriidae here is defined to include only Metzgeriaceae, Aneuraceae and Vandiemeniaceae, and is the sister group to the leafy liverworts. The leafy liverworts Jungermanniidae include the orders Pleuroziales, Porellales and Jungermanniales. It is assumed that the Porellales and the Jungermanniales have split early, at least in the Jurassic period. In the Porellales, the diversification rate may have remained relatively constant for long periods of time but speeding up only recently within some of the families, associated with an explosive radiation of angiosperms. The Jungermanniales are most probably a recently diversified group which has attained the greatest profusion of structure and the most remarkable diversity of leaf development and protective devices for maturing sporophytes. A detailed classification scheme for liverworts is presented. © The Willi Hennig Society 2006.

The International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) Red List Index (RLI) is recognized as one of the key indicators of trends in the status of species. The red-list assessment done by Finnish authorities of species in Finland is taxonomically one of the most extensive national assessments. We used the Finnish Red Lists from 2000 and 2010 to calculate for the first time the national RLIs for 11 taxonomic groups at different trophic levels and with different life cycles. The red-list index is calculated on the basis of changes in red-list categories and indicates trends in the status of biological diversity of sets of species. The RLI value ranges from 0 to 1. The lower the value the faster the set of species is heading toward extinction. If the value is 1, all species in the set are least concern and if the value is 0, all species are (regionally) extinct. The overall RLI of Finnish species decreased. This means that, in Finland, these taxonomic groups were heading toward extinction faster in 2010 than in 2000. Of the analyzed groups of organisms, RLIs of 5 decreased and RLIs of 6 increased. At the national level, the RLIs and status trends varied markedly between species groups. Thus, we concluded that generalizations on the basis of RLIs of a few taxa only may yield a biased view of ongoing trends in the status of biological diversity at the species level. In addition, one overall RLI that includes many different species groups may also be misleading if variation in RLI among species groups is not considered and if RLI values are not presented separately for each group.