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Classification of the biological diversity on Earth is foundational to all areas of research within the natural sciences. Reliable biological nomenclatural and taxonomic systems facilitate efficient access to information about organisms and their names over time. However, broadly sharing, accessing, delivering, and updating these resources remains a persistent problem. This barrier has been acknowledged by the biodiversity data sharing community, yet concrete efforts to standardize and continually update taxonomic names in a sustainable way remain limited. High diversity groups such as arthropods are especially challenging as available specimen data per number of species is substantially lower than vertebrate or plant groups. The Terrestrial Parasite Tracker Thematic Collections Network project developed a workflow for gathering expert-verified taxonomic names across all available sources, aligning those sources, and publishing a single resource that provides a model for future endeavors to standardize digital specimen identification data. The process involved gathering expert-verified nomenclature lists representing the full taxonomic scope of terrestrial arthropod parasites, documenting issues experienced, and finding potential solutions for reconciliation of taxonomic resources against large data publishers. Although discordance between our expert resources and the Global Biodiversity Information Facility are relatively low, the impact across all taxa affects thousands of names that correspond to hundreds of thousands of specimen records. Here, we demonstrate a mechanism for the delivery and continued maintenance of these taxonomic resources, while highlighting the current state of taxon name curation for biodiversity data sharing.

 

A wealth of information about how parasites interact with their hosts already exists in collections, scientific publications, specialized databases, and grey literature. The US National Science Foundation-funded Terrestrial Parasite Tracker Thematic Collection Network (TPT) project began in 2019 to help build a comprehensive picture of arthropod ectoparasites including the evolution of these parasite-host biotic associations, distributions, and the ecological interactions of disease vectors. TPT is a network of biodiversity collections whose data can assist scientists, educators, land managers, and policymakers to better understand the complex relationship between hosts and parasites including emergent properties that may explain the causes and frequency of human and wildlife pathogens. TPT member collections make their association information easier to access via Global Biotic Interactions (GloBI, Poelen et al. 2014), which is periodically archived through Zenodo to track progress in the TPT project. TPT leverages GloBI's ability to index biotic associations from specimen occurrence records that come from existing management systems (e.g., Arctos, Symbiota, EMu, Excel, MS Access) to avoid having to completely rework existing, or build new, cyber-infrastructures before collections can share data. TPT-affiliated collection managers use collection-specific translation tables to connect their verbatim (or original) terms used to describe associations (e.g., "ex", "found on", "host") to their interpreted, machine-readable terms in the OBO Relations Ontology (RO). These interpreted terms enable searches across previously siloed association record sets, while the original verbatim values remain accessible to help retain provenance and allow for interpretation improvements. TPT is an ambitious project, with the goal to database label data from over 1.2 million specimens of arthropod parasites of vertebrates coming from 22 collections across North America. In the first year of the project, the TPT collections created over 73,700 new records and 41,984 images. In addition, 17 TPT data providers and three other collaborators shared datasets that are now indexed by GloBI, visible on the TPT GloBI project page. These datasets came from collection specimen occurrence records and literature sources. Two TPT data archives that capture and preserve the changes in the data coming from TPT to GloBI were published through Zenodo (Poelen et al. 2020a, Poelen et al. 2020b). The archives document the changes in how data are shared by collections including the biotic association data format and quantity of data captured. The Poelen et al. 2020b report included all TPT collections and biotic interactions from Arctos collections in VertNet and the Symbiota Collection of Arthropods Network (SCAN). The total number of interactions included in this report was 376,671 records (500,000 interactions is the overall goal for TPT). In addition, close coordination with TPT collection data managers including many one-on-one conversations, a workshop, and a webinar (Sullivan et al. 2020) was conducted to help guide the data capture of biotic associations. GloBI is an effective tool to help integrate biotic association data coming from occurrence records into an openly accessible, global, linked view of existing species interaction records. The results gleaned from the TPT workshop and Zenodo data archives demonstrate that minimizing changes to existing workflows allow for custom interpretation of collection-specific interaction terms. In addition, including collection data managers in the development of the interaction term vocabularies is an important part of the process that may improve data sharing and the overall downstream data quality. 

Due to its specificity, fluorescence microscopy has become a quintessential imaging tool in cell biology. However, photobleaching, phototoxicity, and related artifacts continue to limit fluorescence microscopy’s utility. Recently, it has been shown that artificial intelligence (AI) can transform one form of contrast into another. We present phase imaging with computational specificity (PICS), a combination of quantitative phase imaging and AI, which provides information about unlabeled live cells with high specificity. Our imaging system allows for automatic training, while inference is built into the acquisition software and runs in real-time. Applying the computed fluorescence maps back to the quantitative phase imaging (QPI) data, we measured the growth of both nuclei and cytoplasm independently, over many days, without loss of viability. Using a QPI method that suppresses multiple scattering, we measured the dry mass content of individual cell nuclei within spheroids. In its current implementation, PICS offers a versatile quantitative technique for continuous simultaneous monitoring of individual cellular components in biological applications where long-term label-free imaging is desirable.

 

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Terrestrial Parasite Tracker indexed biotic interactions and review summary.

The Terrestrial Parasite Tracker (TPT) project began in 2019 and is funded by the National Science foundation to mobilize data from vector and ectoparasite collections to data aggregators (e.g., iDigBio, GBIF) to help build a comprehensive picture of arthropod host-association evolution, distributions, and the ecological interactions of disease vectors which will assist scientists, educators, land managers, and policy makers. Arthropod parasites often are important to human and wildlife health and safety as vectors of pathogens, and it is critical to digitize these specimens so that they, and their biotic interaction data, will be available to help understand and predict the spread of human and wildlife disease.

This data publication contains versioned TPT associated datasets and related data products that were tracked, reviewed and indexed by Global Biotic Interactions (GloBI) and associated tools. GloBI provides open access to finding species interaction data (e.g., predator-prey, pollinator-plant, pathogen-host, parasite-host) by combining existing open datasets using open source software.

If you have questions or comments about this publication, please open an issue at https://github.com/ParasiteTracker/tpt-reporting or contact the authors by email.

Funding:
The creation of this archive was made possible by the National Science Foundation award "Collaborative Research: Digitization TCN: Digitizing collections to trace parasite-host associations and predict the spread of vector-borne disease," Award numbers DBI:1901932 and DBI:1901926

References:
Jorrit H. Poelen, James D. Simons and Chris J. Mungall. (2014). Global Biotic Interactions: An open infrastructure to share and analyze species-interaction datasets. Ecological Informatics. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ecoinf.2014.08.005.

GloBI Data Review Report

Datasets under review:
 - University of Michigan Museum of Zoology Insect Division. Full Database Export 2020-11-20 provided by Erika Tucker and Barry Oconner. accessed via https://github.com/EMTuckerLabUMMZ/ummzi/archive/6731357a377e9c2748fc931faa2ff3dc0ce3ea7a.zip on 2022-06-24T14:02:48.801Z
 - Academy of Natural Sciences Entomology Collection for the Parasite Tracker Project accessed via https://github.com/globalbioticinteractions/ansp-para/archive/5e6592ad09ec89ba7958266ad71ec9d5d21d1a44.zip on 2022-06-24T14:04:22.091Z
 - Bernice Pauahi Bishop Museum, J. Linsley Gressitt Center for Research in Entomology accessed via https://github.com/globalbioticinteractions/bpbm-ent/archive/c085398dddd36f8a1169b9cf57de2a572229341b.zip on 2022-06-24T14:04:37.692Z
 - Texas A&M University, Biodiversity Teaching and Research Collections accessed via https://github.com/globalbioticinteractions/brtc-para/archive/f0a718145b05ed484c4d88947ff712d5f6395446.zip on 2022-06-24T14:06:40.154Z
 - Brigham Young University Arthropod Museum accessed via https://github.com/globalbioticinteractions/byu-byuc/archive/4a609ac6a9a03425e2720b6cdebca6438488f029.zip on 2022-06-24T14:06:51.420Z
 - California Academy of Sciences Entomology accessed via https://github.com/globalbioticinteractions/cas-ent/archive/562aea232ec74ab615f771239451e57b057dc7c0.zip on 2022-06-24T14:07:16.371Z
 - Clemson University Arthropod Collection accessed via https://github.com/globalbioticinteractions/cu-cuac/archive/6cdcbbaa4f7cec8e1eac705be3a999bc5259e00f.zip on 2022-06-24T14:07:40.925Z
 - Denver Museum of Nature and Science (DMNS) Parasite specimens (DMNS:Para) accessed via https://github.com/globalbioticinteractions/dmns-para/archive/a037beb816226eb8196533489ee5f98a6dfda452.zip on 2022-06-24T14:08:00.730Z
 - Field Museum of Natural History IPT accessed via https://github.com/globalbioticinteractions/fmnh/archive/6bfc1b7e46140e93f5561c4e837826204adb3c2f.zip on 2022-06-24T14:18:51.995Z
 - Illinois Natural History Survey Insect Collection accessed via https://github.com/globalbioticinteractions/inhs-insects/archive/38692496f590577074c7cecf8ea37f85d0594ae1.zip on 2022-06-24T14:19:37.563Z
 - UMSP / University of Minnesota / University of Minnesota Insect Collection accessed via https://github.com/globalbioticinteractions/min-umsp/archive/3f1b9d32f947dcb80b9aaab50523e097f0e8776e.zip on 2022-06-24T14:20:27.232Z
 - Milwaukee Public Museum Biological Collections Data Portal accessed via https://github.com/globalbioticinteractions/mpm/archive/9f44e99c49ec5aba3f8592cfced07c38d3223dcd.zip on 2022-06-24T14:20:46.185Z
 - Museum for Southern Biology (MSB) Parasite Collection accessed via https://github.com/globalbioticinteractions/msb-para/archive/178a0b7aa0a8e14b3fe953e770703fe331eadacc.zip on 2022-06-24T15:16:07.223Z
 - The Albert J. Cook Arthropod Research Collection accessed via https://github.com/globalbioticinteractions/msu-msuc/archive/38960906380443bd8108c9e44aeff4590d8d0b50.zip on 2022-06-24T16:09:40.702Z
 - Ohio State University Acarology Laboratory accessed via https://github.com/globalbioticinteractions/osal-ar/archive/876269d66a6a94175dbb6b9a604897f8032b93dd.zip on 2022-06-24T16:10:00.281Z
 - Frost Entomological Museum, Pennsylvania State University accessed via https://github.com/globalbioticinteractions/psuc-ento/archive/30b1f96619a6e9f10da18b42fb93ff22cc4f72e2.zip on 2022-06-24T16:10:07.741Z
 - Purdue Entomological Research Collection accessed via https://github.com/globalbioticinteractions/pu-perc/archive/e0909a7ca0a8df5effccb288ba64b28141e388ba.zip on 2022-06-24T16:10:26.654Z
 - Texas A&M University Insect Collection accessed via https://github.com/globalbioticinteractions/tamuic-ent/archive/f261a8c192021408da67c39626a4aac56e3bac41.zip on 2022-06-24T16:10:58.496Z
 - University of California Santa Barbara Invertebrate Zoology Collection accessed via https://github.com/globalbioticinteractions/ucsb-izc/archive/825678ad02df93f6d4469f9d8b7cc30151b9aa45.zip on 2022-06-24T16:12:29.854Z
 - University of Hawaii Insect Museum accessed via https://github.com/globalbioticinteractions/uhim/archive/53fa790309e48f25685e41ded78ce6a51bafde76.zip on 2022-06-24T16:12:41.408Z
 - University of New Hampshire Collection of Insects and other Arthropods UNHC-UNHC accessed via https://github.com/globalbioticinteractions/unhc/archive/f72575a72edda8a4e6126de79b4681b25593d434.zip on 2022-06-24T16:12:59.500Z
 - Scott L. Gardner and Gabor R. Racz (2021). University of Nebraska State Museum - Parasitology. Harold W. Manter Laboratory of Parasitology. University of Nebraska State Museum. accessed via https://github.com/globalbioticinteractions/unl-nsm/archive/6bcd8aec22e4309b7f4e8be1afe8191d391e73c6.zip on 2022-06-24T16:13:06.914Z
 - Data were obtained from specimens belonging to the United States National Museum of Natural History (USNM), Smithsonian Institution, Washington DC and digitized by the Walter Reed Biosystematics Unit (WRBU). accessed via https://github.com/globalbioticinteractions/usnmentflea/archive/ce5cb1ed2bbc13ee10062b6f75a158fd465ce9bb.zip on 2022-06-24T16:13:38.013Z
 - US National Museum of Natural History Ixodes Records accessed via https://github.com/globalbioticinteractions/usnm-ixodes/archive/c5fcd5f34ce412002783544afb628a33db7f47a6.zip on 2022-06-24T16:13:45.666Z
 - Price Institute of Parasite Research, School of Biological Sciences, University of Utah accessed via https://github.com/globalbioticinteractions/utah-piper/archive/43da8db550b5776c1e3d17803831c696fe9b8285.zip on 2022-06-24T16:13:54.724Z
 - University of Wisconsin Stevens Point, Stephen J. Taft Parasitological Collection accessed via https://github.com/globalbioticinteractions/uwsp-para/archive/f9d0d52cd671731c7f002325e84187979bca4a5b.zip on 2022-06-24T16:14:04.745Z
 - Giraldo-Calderón, G. I., Emrich, S. J., MacCallum, R. M., Maslen, G., Dialynas, E., Topalis, P., … Lawson, D. (2015). VectorBase: an updated bioinformatics resource for invertebrate vectors and other organisms related with human diseases. Nucleic acids research, 43(Database issue), D707–D713. doi:10.1093/nar/gku1117. accessed via https://github.com/globalbioticinteractions/vectorbase/archive/00d6285cd4e9f4edd18cb2778624ab31b34b23b8.zip on 2022-06-24T16:14:11.965Z
 - WIRC / University of Wisconsin Madison WIS-IH / Wisconsin Insect Research Collection accessed via https://github.com/globalbioticinteractions/wis-ih-wirc/archive/34162b86c0ade4b493471543231ae017cc84816e.zip on 2022-06-24T16:14:29.743Z
 - Yale University Peabody Museum Collections Data Portal accessed via https://github.com/globalbioticinteractions/yale-peabody/archive/43be869f17749d71d26fc820c8bd931d6149fe8e.zip on 2022-06-24T16:23:29.289Z

Generated on:
2022-06-24

by:
GloBI's Elton 0.12.4 
(see https://github.com/globalbioticinteractions/elton).

Note that all files ending with .tsv are files formatted 
as UTF8 encoded tab-separated values files.

https://www.iana.org/assignments/media-types/text/tab-separated-values

Included in this review archive are:

README:
  This file.

review_summary.tsv:
  Summary across all reviewed collections of total number of distinct review comments.

review_summary_by_collection.tsv:
  Summary by reviewed collection of total number of distinct review comments.

indexed_interactions_by_collection.tsv: 
  Summary of number of indexed interaction records by institutionCode and collectionCode.

review_comments.tsv.gz:
  All review comments by collection.

indexed_interactions_full.tsv.gz:
  All indexed interactions for all reviewed collections.

indexed_interactions_simple.tsv.gz:
  All indexed interactions for all reviewed collections selecting only sourceInstitutionCode, sourceCollectionCode, sourceCatalogNumber, sourceTaxonName, interactionTypeName and targetTaxonName.

datasets_under_review.tsv:
  Details on the datasets under review.

elton.jar: 
  Program used to update datasets and generate the review reports and associated indexed interactions.

datasets.zip:
  Source datasets used by elton.jar in process of executing the generate_report.sh script.

generate_report.sh:
  Program used to generate the report

generate_report.log:
  Log file generated as part of running the generate_report.sh script
 

 

Multiple scattering and absorption limit the depth at which biological tissues can be imaged with light. In thick unlabeled specimens, multiple scattering randomizes the phase of the field and absorption attenuates light that travels long optical paths. These obstacles limit the performance of transmission imaging. To mitigate these challenges, we developed an epi-illumination gradient light interference microscope (epi-GLIM) as a label-free phase imaging modality applicable to bulk or opaque samples. Epi-GLIM enables studying turbid structures that are hundreds of microns thick and otherwise opaque to transmitted light. We demonstrate this approach with a variety of man-made and biological samples that are incompatible with imaging in a transmission geometry: semiconductors wafers, specimens on opaque and birefringent substrates, cells in microplates, and bulk tissues. We demonstrate that the epi-GLIM data can be used to solve the inverse scattering problem and reconstruct the tomography of single cells and model organisms.

 

The progression of cancer is often accompanied by changes in the mechanical properties of an extracellular matrix. However, limited efforts have been made to reproduce these biological events in vitro. To this end, this study demonstrates that matrix remodeling caused by matrix metalloproteinase (MMP)‐1 regulates phenotypic activities and modulates radiosensitivity of cancer cells exclusively in a 3D matrix. In this study, hepatocarcinoma cells are cultured in a collagen‐based gel tailored to present an elastic modulus of ≈4.0 kPa. The subsequent exposure of the gel to MMP‐1 decreases the elastic modulus from 4.0 to 0.5 kPa. In response to MMP‐1, liver cancer cells undergo active proliferation, downregulation of E‐cadherin, and the loss of detoxification capacity. The resulting spheroids are more sensitive to radiation than the spheroids cultured in the stiffer gel not exposed to MMP‐1. Overall, this study serves to better understand and control the effects of MMP‐induced matrix remodeling.