ITIS - About

<!DOCTYPE HTML PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD HTML 4.01 Transitional//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/html4/loose.dtd"> <html lang="en-US"> <head> <title>ITIS - About</title> <meta name="description" content="The Integrated Taxonomic Information System (ITIS, www.itis.gov) partners with specialists from around the world to assemble scientific names and their taxonomic relationships and distributes that data openly through publicly available software. The ITIS mission is to communicate a comprehensive taxonomy of global species that enables biodiversity information to be discovered, indexed, and connected across all human endeavors. ITIS is made up of 11 active MOU partners committed to improving and continually updating scientific and common names of all seven Kingdoms of Life (Archaea, Bacteria, Protozoa, Chromista, Fungi, Plantae, and Animalia)."> <meta name="keywords" content="Integrated Taxonomic Information System, ITIS, Taxonomy, Taxonomic Data, Taxonomic Classification Report, taxonomic resources, taxonomy, taxonomic databases, taxon, taxa, scientific names, biodiversity, systematics, organisms, species, flora, fauna, nomenclature, classification, diversity, biological diversity, plants, animals"> <meta name="viewport" content="width=device-width, initial-scale=1"> <link rel="shortcut icon" type="image/jpg" href="/Static/images/favicon.ico" /> <link rel="stylesheet" href="/Static/css/itisstyle.css" type="text/css">      <script type="text/javascript" src="/Static/javascript/jquery-3.5.1.min.js"></script> <script type="text/javascript" src="/Static/javascript/jquery-migrate-3.3.2.min.js"></script> <script type="text/javascript" src="/Static/javascript/superfish-2013.js"></script> <script type="text/javascript" src="/Static/javascript/supersubs-2013.js"></script> <script type="text/javascript" src="/Static/javascript/hoverIntent.js"></script> <link rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" href="/Static/css/superfish-2013.css" media="screen"> <link rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" href="/Static/css/superfish-vertical-2013.css" media="screen"> <script type="text/javascript"> var winPath = window.location.pathname.substring(1); var operation = winPath.toLowerCase().substr(8, 6); // initialise plugins $(document).ready(function(){ $("ul.sf-menu").supersubs({ minWidth: 5, // minimum width of sub-menus in em units maxWidth: 15, // maximum width of sub-menus in em units extraWidth: 1 // extra width can ensure lines don't sometimes turn over // due to slight rounding differences and font-family }).superfish({ animation: {height:'show'}, // slide-down effect without fade-in delay: 1200 // 1.2 second delay on mouseout }); // call supersubs first, then superfish, so that subs are // not display:none when measuring. Call before initialising // containing tabs for same reason. }); </script>   <script>(function(w,d,s,l,i){w[l]=w[l]||[];w[l].push( {'gtm.start': new Date().getTime(),event:'gtm.js'} );var f=d.getElementsByTagName(s)[0], j=d.createElement(s),dl=l!='dataLayer'?'&l='+l:'';j.async=true;j.src= 'https://www.googletagmanager.com/gtm.js?id='+i+dl;f.parentNode.insertBefore(j,f); })(window,document,'script','dataLayer','GTM-TKQR8KP');</script>   <script>(function(w,d,s,l,i){w[l]=w[l]||[];w[l].push( {'gtm.start': new Date().getTime(),event:'gtm.js'} );var f=d.getElementsByTagName(s)[0], j=d.createElement(s),dl=l!='dataLayer'?'&l='+l:'';j.async=true;j.src= 'https://www.googletagmanager.com/gtm.js?id='+i+dl;f.parentNode.insertBefore(j,f); })(window,document,'script','dataLayer','GTM-TKJZMH9');</script>    </head> <body bgcolor="#ffffff" class="subpage" leftmargin="0" topmargin="0" marginheight="0" marginwidth="0"> <table border="0" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" role="presentation"> <tbody> <tr> <td colspan="3" valign="bottom"> <img name="toplogo" src="/Static/images/ITIS-Logo.jpg" class="itis-logo" alt="The ITIS Logo" border="0" hspace="0" vspace="0"> <h1 class="itis-title">Integrated Taxonomic Information System - About</h1> </td> </tr> <tr> <td width="115" valign="top">  <ul class="sf-menu sf-vertical"> <li class="current"> <a href="/">Home</a> </li> <li class="current"> <a href="#">About</a> <ul> <li> <a href="/about_itis.html">Mission</a> </li> <li> <a href="/whatsnew.html">What's New</a> </li> <li><a href="#">Organizational Information</a> <ul> <li> <a href="/info.html">History</a> </li> <li> <a href="/organ.html">Organization and Partners</a> </li> <li> <a href="/mou.html">Memorandum of Understanding</a> </li> <li> <a href="/itis_primer.html">Data Development History</a> </li> </ul> </li> <li> <a href="#">Data Definition and Standards</a> <ul> <li> <a href="/standard.html">Standards</a> </li> <li> <a href="/data_definition.html">Data Definition</a> </li> </ul> </li> <li> <a href="#">Frequently Asked Questions</a> <ul> <li> <a href="/pdf/faq_itis_tsn.pdf">What is an ITIS TSN?</a> </li> <li> <a href="/citation.html">How Do I Cite ITIS?</a> </li> <li> <a href="/standard_report_link.html">How Do I Link to ITIS?</a> </li> <li> <a href="/download_format.html">What is the format of a download file?</a> </li> </ul> </li> <li> <a href="/comments.html">Contact Us</a> </li> </ul> </li> <li> <a href="#">Data Access and Tools</a> <ul> <li> <a href="/access.html">Data Access Information</a> </li> <li> <a href="/tools.html">ITIS Tools</a> </li> <li> <a href="/advanced_search.html">Advanced Search</a> </li> <li> <a href="#">Web Services</a> <ul> <li> <a href="/web_service.html">Web Service Information</a> </li> <li> <a href="/ws_description.html">Description of ITIS Web Services</a> </li> <li> <a href="/ws_develop.html">Developing a Client</a> </li> <li> <a href="/solr_documentation.html">ITIS Solr Web Services</a> </li> <li> <a href="/solr_examples.html">ITIS Solr WS Examples</a> </li> </ul> </li> <li> <a href="/hierarchy.html">Hierarchical Report</a> </li> <li> <a href="/taxmatch.html">Compare Names</a> </li> </ul> </li> <li> <a href="#">Get ITIS Data</a> <ul> <li> <a href="#">Full Database Download</a> <ul> <li> <a href="/ftp_download.html">Instructions</a> </li> <li> <a href="/downloads/index.html">Database Files</a> </li> </ul> </li> <li> <a href="/download.html">Download Data in TWB Format</a> </li> </ul> </li> <li> <a href="#">Become a Data Partner</a> <ul> <li> <a href="/contribute.html">Contribute</a> </li> <li> <a href="/twb.html">Taxonomic Workbench Help</a> </li> </ul> </li> </ul> </td> <td><img src="/Static/images/spacer.gif" width="1" height="50" border="0" alt="spacer image"></td> <td valign="top">  <p> The ITIS <a href="organ.html">program</a> is driven by a mission: communicate a comprehensive taxonomy of global species that enables biodiversity information to be discovered, indexed, and connected across all human endeavors. </p> <p> To achieve our mission we <a href="contribute.html">partner</a> with specialists from around the world to assemble scientific names and their taxonomic relationships, and distribute that data through publicly available software. The result we seek is a complete, current, literature-referenced, and expert validated digital taxonomy that is <a href="citation.html">open</a> so it can be delivered and integrated into biological data management systems across the world. This will <ul> <li>increase the utility of the amassed and growing biological data</li> <li>support the understanding of life from the smallest unit to the largest unit - genes to ecosystems</li> <li>encourage broad sharing, reuse, and openness of government and non-government data</li> <li>fully leverage the US Federal Government's biological data for the public good</li> </ul> <p> This theory of change will bear out because the scientific name, used to label and classify biodiversity, is one of the most universally-adopted standards in all of science (<a href="http://www.gbif.org/document/80625" target="_blank">Welter-Schultes, 2013</a>). Scientific names have been in use for centuries. They, therefore, hold the key to unlocking the full potential of biodiversity data to confront pressing social and environmental challenges resulting from land use change, climate change, and the interaction of them both. </p> <p> ITIS data is available for <a href="access.html">download</a> in several formats, and the entire database is available for <a href="ftp_download.html">download</a> and use under CC0 public domain. ITIS and <a href="http://www.sp2000.org/" target="_blank">Species 2000</a> are a <a href="https://www.catalogueoflife.org/data/browse" target="_blank">Catalogue of Life (COL)</a> partnership, which means the network of <a href="contribute.html">ITIS data contributors</a> help form the taxonomic backbone used by the entire bioinformatic community. </p> <p> Our desired impact is to let the US Government and the entire scientific community efficiently and effectively conduct their scientific endeavors, exploration, and research activities with the help of highly connected biodiversity data. That connected data is supported by an infrastructure of species names and their classification that can digitally integrate biological knowledge scattered across literature, specimen collections, databases, and stores of DNA sequences. </p> <p> That is why ITIS was formed over <a href="itis_primer.html">twenty-five years ago</a>. </p> "We knew that many Federal and State agencies were involved in researching and managing living organisms. However, there was no single taxonomic system at the time to ensure that their data and information was interchangeable. So, as an initiative in 'good government', several Federal natural resource agencies decided to develop a standard taxonomic system that could be used across the federal government and shared with the public and private sectors. We considered ITIS the 'Rosetta Stone' for biological taxonomy!" <p> <ul><li>Dr. Michael Ruggiero, the first Director of ITIS</li></ul> </p> <div align="right"></div>  </td> <td><img src="/Static/images/spacer.gif" width="1" height="230" border="0" alt="spacer image"></td> </tr> <tr> <td><img src="/Static/images/spacer.gif" width="115" height="50" border="0" alt="spacer image"></td> <td><img src="/Static/images/spacer.gif" width="22" height="1" border="0" alt="spacer image"></td> <td><img src="/Static/images/spacer.gif" width="531" height="1" border="0" alt="spacer image"></td> <td><img src="/Static/images/spacer.gif" width="1" height="1" border="0" alt="spacer image"></td> </tr> </tbody> </table> <div id="footer_div"></div> <script> $( '#footer_div' ).load( "Static/include/footer.html" ); </script> </body> </html>

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ITIS - About