Gracia

Development in technology has made possible the integration of individual databases into shared datasets that allow dissemination of data and large-scale and long term analyses. A concrete example of this is the Ocean Biogeographic Information System (OBIS). Between 2005-2006 INVEMAR, executed procedures and task with the goal of integrating the data content in the Marine Biodiversity Information System of Colombia (SIBM) into the OBIS node Caribbean. In the project, the main goals were: 1. To georeference the collections of fishes, mollusks, echinoderms and cnidarians of the Museo de Historia Natural Marina de Colombia (MHNMC). 2. To establish and generate the software filters required to select the biological records that will be made available to the OBIS users, using a client server connected to INVEMAR. 3. To develop the necessary software to integrate the SIBM system to the OBIS network in consultation with user groups. For this, a temporal coverage between 1956 and 2007 was obtained, representing about 2.350 species with 16.661 distributional records for fishes, mollusks, echinoderms and cnidarians. The habitat coverage includes seashores (littoral), sublittoral seabed, mangroves, seagrasses, coral reefs, azooxanthellate coral communities, and continental margin soft bottoms. In the System, data bases in multimedia electronic format of the species stored in the MHNMC, as well the related information of their capture and identification according to standards already established, are combined. The SIBM is a key tool of access to scientific, technical and public levels on the marine and coastal Colombian biodiversity. This is a model of a Caribbean database accessible on-line and demonstrably useful integrated to OBIS.