The World Register of Marine Species (WoRMS) through the looking glass: insights from the data management team in light of the crystal anniversary of WoRMS
Vandepitte, L.; Dekeyzer, S.; Decock, W.; Delgat, L.; Boydens, B.; Tyberghein, L.; Vanhoorne, B.; Hernandez, F.; Mees, J.; Horton, T.; Kroh, A.; Boyko, C.B.; Ahyong, S.T. (2024). The World Register of Marine Species (WoRMS) through the looking glass: insights from the data management team in light of the crystal anniversary of WoRMS. Hydrobiologia 2024. https://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s10750-024-05688-y
In: Hydrobiologia. Springer: The Hague. ISSN 0018-8158; e-ISSN 1573-5117
The World Register of Marine Species (WoRMS) started in 2007 with the question “how many species live in our oceans?”. Now, a little over 15 years later, WoRMS is able to answer several ques?tions related to marine species discovery rates and provides a dynamic number of existing marine spe?cies, based on the information provided by hundreds of taxonomic experts worldwide, who have proven to be diverse and dynamic. We present basic statistics on marine species discovery rates based on the currently available content of WoRMS, as well as insights in the day-to-day activities and dynamics of our edito?rial board and the progress made so far on the content priorities as defned by the WoRMS Steering Com?mittee. As for all dynamic systems, WoRMS is not complete and faces challenges. As an endorsed pro?ject of the UN Ocean Decade, WoRMS aims to tackle a number of these challenges and knowledge-gaps by 2030, including detailed documentation of author?ships and original descriptions, and will provide con?tinuous support to all marine initiatives, programs and projects that rely on WoRMS as an authoritative classifcation and catalogue of marine names.
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