biodiversitydatalinks

Resources for Environmental-based Research on Species Distribution

Species Presence Data (Vouchered)

HerpNET - Distributed database portal for a global network of natural history museum collections for amphibians and reptiles.

ORNIS - Distributed database portal for a global network of natural history museum collections for birds.

MaNIS - Distributed database portal for a global network of natural history museum collections for mammals.

FishNet 2 - Distributed database portal for a global network of natural history museum collections for fish.

GBIF - Global Biodiversity Information Facility provides data from over one thousand providers, over 141 million records and counting....

In light of the aggregation of these various collections under a common portal, I would encourage communicating with the original data providers, especially when questions of species identification or location occurs. Inspect the original voucher... Inform the collection manager... Acknowledge their contribution.

Climate Data Resources:

IPCC Data Distribution Centre - The data center for the Intergovernmental Panel for Climate Change, providing observational data, general circulation model datasets, socio-economic scenarios and other environmental scenarios. Both general introductory material and primary literature references are provided.

Statistically Downscaled WCRP CMIP3 Climate Projections - An archive of downscaled translations of 112 climate projections developed through the World Climate Research Programme's Coupled Model Intercomparison Phase 3 (CMIP3) effort, representing 16 CMIP3 models and 3 greenhouse gas emissions scenarios. Projection-specific attributes include:

-- surface air temperature and precipitation

-- 1950-2099 time coverage on a monthly time step

-- conterminous United States spatial coverage at 1/8° spatial resolution, including portions of Canada and Mexico.

NCAR, National Center for Atmospheric Research Community Data Portal - Links to all the projects and downloadable datasets of UCAR/NCAR

PRISM Group Climate Data - PRISM (Parameter-elevation Regressions on Independent Slopes Model) climate mapping system, developed by Dr. Christopher Daly, is constantly being updated and has historic and current climate data sets. The new PRISM data sets are 30 arc second resolution.

Spectral Modeling Downscaling Results for Western North America - Hourly, daily, monthly and yearly averages for regional and continental US. (10 km resolution)

Earth System Grid - DOE's main data portal for national labs and research centers for public access to climate data products, e.g. CCSM, CCSM POP (Parallel Ocean Process version), CSIM, CLM, PCM, POP. FTP access requires registration.

Paleoclimate Reconstructions, NOAA Paleoclimatology Program - Both global and regional reconstructions of past climate of varying resolution and time periods for Air Temperature, Precipitation, Hydroclimate, Circulation, Vegetation, Sea Surface Temperature, and Global Ice Coverage among others.

Paleoclimate Modelling Intercomparison Project Phase II (PMIP 2) - Focusing on model-model and model-data comparisons of paleo-climate and environmental conditions, this site is a good resource to find current projects and publications including datasets.

To visualize and download data from PMIP, try National Climatic Data Center's Model Visualization site.

Goddard Institute for Space Studies (GISS) focuses on climate and space research; the website has both climate-related data, maps, animations, and software tools for visualizing datasets.

Environmental Data Sources:

Tides and Currents, NOAA - For the US including Alaska and Hawaii, data for tides, waterlevels, and shoreline currents in historic, current and future projections. There is limited global sea level trend data available (mostly European stations).

European Environmental Agency - Includes latest news in environmental research and policy for Europe as well as live maps and GIS data for climate, climate change scenerios, DEM, CORINE landcover, emissions grids, and more.

BACK TO GISPORTAL

Contact: GIS-WEB contact (replace AT with sign)

Last Updated: 31 July 2008.