EUBrazilOpenBio launches its online training

24 April 2013

Educating and enabling current and potential users of EUBrazilOpenBio is key to unlocking new knowledge and shaping effective policy on biodiversity challenges.

Biodiversity boosts ecosystem productivity where each species, no matter how small, all have an important role to play. Improving research, enabling access to open resources and sharing results are fundamental steps in understanding the impact of climate change and human exploitation of natural resources. EUBrazilOpenBio is focused on tackling the complexity of biodiversity science such as the diversity of multidisciplinary datasets spanning from climatology to earth sciences by integrating advanced computing resources with data sources across Europe and Brazil.

"EUBrazilOpenBio is addressing a very large user community, which has very little knowledge about the infrastructure. It is therefore important to have material that can help new users to understand the potential of this system.

For this purpose, we adopt the following approach.
First of all some basic material will be produced to explain the Use cases EUBrazilOpenBIo is focusing on. Our 2 main use cases deal with the Integration between Regional & Global Taxonomies,  and with Data usability and the use of ecological niche modeling. For these 2 Use Cases we have 2 applications available in the EUBrazilOpenBio webportal and several services to be exploited by the biodiversity user communities. Thus this training material will help biodiversity users to understand and use these applications, and see the benefits they can gain.

Along with this material we want to capture new users and new sub-communities in the biodiversity field. Material will be available for training new developers that could bring new applications within the EUBrazilOpenBio platform. This technical material will help them in using different components of the technology we have.
Finally we have to frame this with other training activities for the benefit of higher education institutions and universities, with training materials combining our technology with the basic principles of taxonomy and ecological niche modelling".

Ignacio Blanquer, UPV- EUBrazilOpenBio Training activities coordinator

Who is the eTraining for?

Educating and enabling current and potential users of EUBrazilOpenBio is key to unlocking new knowledge and shaping effective policy on biodiversity challenges. The EUBrazilOpenBio anytime, anywhere eTraining tools are designed for:
    - Researchers: Biodiversity, Life science, Climate Change
    - Application Developers: technical advice and guidance on adapting applications to the infrastructure
    - Regulatory authorities and policy decision-makers

How is the training structured?

The eTraining tools comprise step-by-step modules that can be used anytime, anywhere. The first module is an Introduction to EUBrazilOpenBio recommended to all trainees to understand the value-add and basic concepts of this international initiative. The other modules are specifically targeted at application developers with specific technical content or to researchers with a focus on the use cases and benefits.

To access the training material we simply ask you to register for free to EUBrazilOpenBio webchannel.
You will then be able to access not only the applications, but also the general services for species data discovery (occurrences and taxonomies) and the geo server included in the training.