WoRMS Editorial Board (2020). World Register of Marine Species. Available from http://www.marinespecies.org at VLIZ. Accessed 2020-04-15. doi:10.14284/170
Abstract
The aim of a World Register of Marine Species (WoRMS) is to provide an authoritative and comprehensive list of names of marine organisms, including information on synonymy. While the highest priority goes to valid names, other names in use are included so that this register can serve as a guide to interpret taxonomic literature.
The content of WoRMS is controlled by taxonomic and thematic experts, not by database managers. WoRMS has an editorial management system where each taxonomic group is represented by an expert who has the authority over the content, and is responsible for controlling the quality of the information. Each of these main taxonomic editors can invite several specialists of smaller groups within their area of responsibility to join them.
This register of marine species grew out of the European Register of Marine Species (ERMS), and its combination with several other species registers maintained at the Flanders Marine Institute (VLIZ). Rather than building separate registers for all projects, and to make sure taxonomy used in these different projects is consistent, VLIZ developed a consolidated database called ‘Aphia’. A list of marine species registers included in Aphia is available here. MarineSpecies.org is the web interface for the marine taxa available in this Aphia database. WoRMS combines information from Aphia with other authoritative marine species lists which are maintained by others (e.g. AlgaeBase, FishBase), the so-called 'externally hosted and managed species databases'.
Resources to build MarineSpecies.org and Aphia were provided mainly by the EU Network of Excellence ‘Marine Biodiversity and Ecosystem Functioning’ (MarBEF), and also by the EU funded Species 2000 Europe and ERMS projects.
Aphia contains valid species names, synonyms and vernacular names, and extra information such as literature and biogeographic data. Besides species names, Aphia also contains the higher classification in which each scientific name is linked to its parent taxon. The classification used is a ‘compromise’ between established systems and recent changes. Its aim is to aid data management, rather than suggest any taxonomic or phylogenetic opinion on species relationships.
Keeping WoRMS up-to-date is a continuous process. New information is entered daily by the taxonomic editors and by the members of our data management team. Often data also come in from contributions of large datasets, such as global or regional species lists. No database of this size is without errors and omissions. We can’t promise to make any errors, but we do promise to follow up and give feedback on any communications pointing out errors. Feedback is very welcome!
The text on the WoRMS pages is open-access under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC-BY). This License permits unrestricted use, provided it is cited as requested on the WoRMS webpages, unless stated otherwise on the individual pages.
Images are by default open-access under the terms of the CC BY-NC-SA license, unless stated otherwise.
Re-distribution of the entire database is not permitted, unless by prior written agreement. This is mainly to avoid circulation of (quickly) outdated copies of WoRMS, accessible through different pathways which can lead to confusion for our many users.
In exceptional cases, institutes may request a copy of the database (using this form), which will be assessed by two WoRMS Steering Committee members and the Data Management Team.
These data downloads consist of the taxonomic data only, and do not include additional data such as distributions, traits, notes, etc.
We strongly encourage the use of the on-line tools and available webservices instead of data requests, as the on-line database and webservices can guarantee continuous updates.
The WoRMS Editorial Board maintains this Register, but is aware that the content can have omissions and errors.
If you come across any error or incomplete information or you are willing to contribute to this initiative, please contact the Data Management Team or check out our Contribute page.
The majority of the photo gallery drawings used at the first and second level of the gallery are reproduced on WoRMS with permission of the Linnean Society of London. The DMT is grateful to them for granting permission for use, thereby giving us the opportunity to make the central entry-point of our photo gallery more uniform. Where images are taken from other resources, this is clearly mentioned on the image.