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First of All ...

Tony Barnosky, Museum of Paleontology, University of California, Berkely: Paleontology Database Network. A link directory for promoting communication about electronic databases in palaeontology. See also here. This expired link is available through the Internet Archive´s Wayback Machine.

! BioDeepTime:
This project seeks to address one of the central challenges in biodiversity science by compiling and harmonizing ecological time series from modern and fossil sources to investigate how biological dynamics and drivers vary across timescales ranging from months to millions of years. Note likewise here.
Please take notice:
! J. Smith et al. (2023): BioDeepTime: A database of biodiversity time series for modern and fossil assemblages. Open access, Global Ecol Biogeogr.
Note table 1: Approximate temporal grain (the amount of time represented in a sample) for time series, number of time series and number of samples from source databases included in BioDeepTime.
"... The BioDeepTime database enables integrated biodiversity analyses across a far greater range of temporal scales than has previously been possible. It can be used to provide critical insights into how natural systems will respond to ongoing and future environmental changes as well as new opportunities for theoretical insights into the temporal scaling of biodiversity dynamics ..."

E. Callaway (2015): Computers read the fossil record. Palaeontologists hope that software can construct fossil databases directly from research papers. In PDF, Nature Toolbox. See also here.

! The Global Biodiversity Information Facility (GBIF):
GBIF is an international network and data infrastructure funded by the world's governments and aimed at providing anyone, anywhere, open access to data about all types of life on Earth. Excellent!

! R. Lockwood et al. (2018): Utilizing the Paleobiology Database to Provide Educational Opportunities for Undergraduates. In PDF.
See likewise here. Worth checking out: Chapter 2, starting on PDF page 4,
"How to Use the Paleobiology Database".

Hannes Löser (Dresden; Hermosillo), Jürgen Kullmann (Tübingen) and Olga Dietl (Stuttgart): Datenbanken in der Paläontologie (in German).

Norman MacLeod, PaleoNet: Useful links.

A. Palandacic et al. (2024): An annotated catalogue of selected historical type specimens, including genetic data, housed in the Natural History Museum Vienna. Free access, ZooKeys, 1203: 253–323.

ViFaBio, The Virtual Library of Biology (University Library Johann Christian Senckenberg, Frankfurt/Main, Germany):
! Database Guide.

C. Wang et al. (2021): The Deep-Time Digital Earth program: data-driven discovery in geosciences. In PDF, National Science Review, 8: nwab027.
See also here.

! Arctic Plant Fossils (hosted by the Institute of Botany, Chinese Academy of Sciences).
This interactive illustrated catalogue of Cretaceous and Paleogene Arctic plant fossils is the outcome of a project from the United States Geological Survey and administered through the University of Oxford, UK, and the Imperial College, London.
Images of the fossils and information on where they were found can be accessed through interactive maps,
or navigating the site by means of tables of taxonomic names (if known), museum collections or the collectors and researchers who worked on them. Excellent!

! R. Barclay, P. Wilf, D. Dilcher, A. Sokoloff, J. Leon-Guerrero & C. Thurman: Cuticle Database. The Cuticle Database Project aims to promote the understanding and identification of living and fossil plants. This project is a collaborative effort between researchers at Northwestern University, The Field Museum, the Florida Museum of Natural History, and Pennsylvania State University. See also here:
! R. Barclay, et al. (2007): The cuticle database: developing an interactive tool for taxonomic and paleoenvironmental study of the fossil cuticle record. PDF file, In: Jarzen, D. M., Steven, R., Retallack, G. J. and Jarzen, S. A. (eds.), Advances in Angiosperm Paleobotany and Paleoclimatic Reconstruction, Contributions Honouring David L. Dilcher and Jack A. Wolfe, Courier Forschungsinstitut Senckenberg, Frankfurt, pgs. 39-56.

! BioDeepTime:
This project seeks to address one of the central challenges in biodiversity science by compiling and harmonizing ecological time series from modern and fossil sources to investigate how biological dynamics and drivers vary across timescales ranging from months to millions of years.
Please take notice:
! J. Smith et al. (2023): BioDeepTime: A database of biodiversity time series for modern and fossil assemblages. Open access, Global Ecol Biogeogr.
Note table 1: Approximate temporal grain (the amount of time represented in a sample) for time series, number of time series and number of samples from source databases included in BioDeepTime.

! Fossil Record 2 (Department of Earth Sciences University of Bristol). This is a near-complete listing of the diversity of life through time, compiled at the level of the family. Go to:
! The fossil Record 2. Recoeding the history and diversity of live, 30 phyla, 122 classes, 701 orders and 5638 families. The data set lists basic data derived from The Fossil Record 2 (Benton, 1993), on the diversity, origination, and extinction of all life, continental life, and marine life from the Vendian to the present-day.

Museum of Paleontology (UCMP), University of California at Berkeley: Web Lift for Taxa. This new version of the UCMP Web Lift to Taxa breaks the long table of the old version into several shorter lists.

Museum of Paleontology (UCMP), University of California at Berkeley: The Phylogeny of Life. The ancestor/descendant relationships which connect all organisms that have ever lived. You can learn about the history of life on Earth by tracing life´s phylogeny from three different starting points: "The Biosphere", "The Metazoa" and "Vertebrates". Explore the page on navigating, with a special page on navigating the Phylogeny Wing, both of which contain hints and help.

! Biodiversity Heritage Library. Ten major natural history museum libraries, botanical libraries, and research institutions have joined to form the Biodiversity Heritage Library Project. The group is developing a strategy and operational plan to digitize the published literature of biodiversity held in their respective collections. For the first time in history, the core of our natural history and herbaria library collections will be available to a truly global audience. Browse by titles, authors, subjects, names, map, or year.
Go to: Plants. Currently mor then 1500 titles tagged with "Plants". Superbly done!
Comment: Using "View text" is much quicker (for a first glance) then "View image".

! Biodiversity Heritage Library. Ten major natural history museum libraries, botanical libraries, and research institutions have joined to form the Biodiversity Heritage Library Project. The group is developing a strategy and operational plan to digitize the published literature of biodiversity held in their respective collections. For the first time in history, the core of our natural history and herbaria library collections will be available to a truly global audience. Browse by titles, authors, subjects, names, map, or year.
Go to: Plants. Currently mor then 1500 titles tagged with "Plants". Superbly done!
Comment: Using "View text" is much quicker (for a first glance) then "View image".

! The Canadian Heritage Information Network (CHIN): CHIN is a national centre of excellence that provides a visible face to Canada's heritage through the world of networked information. Search for:
Botany.
Palynology.
Paleontology.

! Catalogue of Life (by Species 2000, Leiden The Netherlands).
The most complete authoritative list of the world's species - maintained by hundreds of global taxonomists.
Go to: Kingdom Plantae.

CSIRO Marine and Atmospheric Research Data Centre: Web-based Resources for Biodiversity - a preliminary selection. This page aims to bring together in one place significant internet resources in the areas of searchable databases of species names, systematic treatments of major groups, checklists, etc. Botany is starting with "57".

The Evolution of Terrestrial Ecosystems Program (ETE). Website hosted by Smithsonian´s National Museum of Natural History. The ETE program investigates Earth´s land biotas throughout their 400 million year history. Go to:
! ETE Relational Database and ETE DataNet.
The ETE relational database is now partially united with the Paleobiology Database Project´s (PBDB) relational database. All primary database functions (queries, entries and updates) are available through the PBDB home page. The new combined database compiles information from the terrestrial and marine record, but lacks some of the data fields present in the original ETE database.

Rob Fensome, Andrew MacRae, and Graham Williams, Project of the Geological Survey of Canada (Atlantic): Dinoflagellate Classification Database (DINOFLAJ). DINOFLAJ is a database system containing a current classification of fossil and living dinoflagellates down to generic rank, and an index of fossil dinoflagellates at generic, specific, and infraspecific ranks.

J.T. Flannery-Sutherland et al. (2022): fossilbrush: An R package for automated detection and resolution of anomalies in palaeontological occurrence data. Open access, Methods in Ecology and Evolution, 13: 2404-2418.
Go to: cran.r-project.org: fossilbrush: Automated Cleaning of Fossil Occurrence Data. See also here.
! Access to the Paleobiology Database.

! Fossil Record 2. See also here (the current version of this page). The Fossil Record 2 is a near-complete listing of the diversity of life through time, compiled at the level of the family. Search any name in the database or search by family name or select families by stratigraphic range, kingdom, habitat, phylum, chapter or other names - or select by stratigraphic range in which the families lived.
The Fossil Record 2 database (Benton, M. J. (Ed.) 1993, Chapman & Hall, London. 845 pp.) is originally compiled in Excel by Dr. Mary Benton, WWW work by Dilshat Hewzulla. Select by Phylum.

! The Global Biodiversity Information Facility (GBIF):
GBIF is an international network and data infrastructure funded by the world's governments and aimed at providing anyone, anywhere, open access to data about all types of life on Earth. Excellent!

! M. Gregory et al.(2009): Fossil dicot wood names – an annotated list with full bibliography. IAWA Journal, Supplement 6. 220 pp. See also here.
This publication represents a comprehensive list available for generic and specific names of fossil dicot woods, giving synonyms, geological ages and geographical sources. Excellent!

Robert Huber, Jens Klump and Stefan Götz, Germany: Stratigraphy.Net. Stratigraphy.Net aims to provide free and open access to geoscientific information and data with special emphasis on the disciplines stratigraphy, paleontology and sedimentology. Go to: News.

! The Index Nominum Genericorum ING (U.S. National Herbarium, Department of Botany, Smithsonian Institution). A compilation of generic names published for organisms covered by the ICN: International Code of Nomenclature for Algae, Fungi, and Plants. Excellent!

! Interim Register of Marine and Nonmarine Genera (IRMNG), a project of OBIS Australia, now hosted at VLIZ, Belgium. The Interim Register of Marine and Nonmarine Genera is a provisional compilation of genus names – including species names in many cases – and covers both living and extinct biota into a single system to support taxonomic and other queries dealing with e.g. homonyms, authorities, parent-child relationships, spelling variations and distinctions between marine and non-marine or fossil and recent taxa. Excellent! See especially:
! IRMNG taxon details. "Family" sporae dispersae with at present 2871 genera listed.
! Dinoflagellates (extant and fossil).
! Acritarchs.

! iDigBio. The Integrated Digitized Biocollections, the National Resource for Advancing Digitization of Biodiversity Collections (ADBC) funded by the National Science Foundation. Through ADBC, data and images for millions of biological specimens are being made available in electronic format for the research community. Go to:
! iDigBio Portal: iDigBio serves as the coordinating center for the national digitization effort; fosters partnerships and innovations; facilitates the determination and dissemination of digitization practices and workflows. Worth to check out: Digitization Resources.
! See especially: Search records.

! The International Fossil Plant Names Index (IFPNI).
The IFPNI provides an authoritative online, open-access, community-generated registry of fossil plant nomenclature as a service to the global scientific community (headquartered at the Fundamental Botanical Library, National Institute of Carpology (Gaertnerian Institution), Moscow). For more information please take notice:
! A.B. Doweld (2016): The International Fossil Plant Names Index (IFPNI): A global registry of scientific names of fossil organisms started. In PDF, The Palaeobotanist, 65: 203–208. Also worth checking out:
! B. Zhao (2023): pyIFPNI: A package for querying and downloading plant fossil data from the IFPNI. Free access, Plant Diversity.

The Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew:
! The Kew Herbarium Catalogue . This Herbarium houses approximately 7 million specimens, collected from all around the world. Navigate from advanced search.

! The Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew: Plant Micromorphology Bibliographic Database. A database of references relevant to the anatomy and pollen/spore morphology of flowering plants, gymnosperms and ferns. Free of charge. See also here.

! Litholex. Maintained by the Federal Institute for Geosciences and Natural Resources (Bundesanstalt für Geowissenschaften und Rohstoffe, BGR), Hannover, Germany. Database about stratigraphic units in Germany (in German).

! R. Lockwood et al. (2018): Utilizing the Paleobiology Database to Provide Educational Opportunities for Undergraduates. In PDF.
See likewise here. Worth checking out: Chapter 2, starting on PDF page 4,
"How to Use the Paleobiology Database".

L.A. Lukes et al. (2019): Leveraging a large database to increase access to undergraduate research experiences. In PDF, Scholarship and Practice of Undergraduate Research.
"... This article provides a case study of how one such large database, the Paleobiology Database (PBDB), has been leveraged in two ways to support the engagement of students in undergraduate research experiences ..."

! MORPYHLL - database for acquisition of ecophysiologically relevant morphometric data of fossil leaves.
See also here. Please note:
C. Traiser et al. (2018): MORPHYLL: A a database of fossil leaves and their morphological traits. Palaeontologia Electronica, 21.1.1T: 1-17. Available in PDF.

Geobibliothek Münster, Germany: Databases (in German).
Website outdated, download a version archived by the Internet Archive´s Wayback Machine.

! National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), Washington, DC. NOAA Paleoclimatology. NOAA Paleoclimatology operate the World Data Center for Paleoclimatology which distributes data contributed by scientists around the world. Paleo data come from natural sources such as tree rings, ice cores, corals, and ocean and lake sediments, and extend the archive of climate back hundreds to millions of years. Go to:
Fossil and Surface Pollen Data. The NOAA Paleoclimatology Program distributes the product of various collaborative efforts to collect and organize pollen records from around the globe (pollen counts and related information). Data contributed since March 2005 are available from the Neotoma Paleoecology Database.

! The Paleobiology Database (PBDB).
PBDB is a public database of paleontological data that anyone can use, maintained by an international non-governmental group of paleontologists. The Paleobiology Database has been supported by many grants over the years, mostly from the National Science Foundation. You may navigate from the
Paleobiology Database Guest Menu or check out the
Frequently Asked Questions. Please also note the detailed and excellent tutorial:
! M.D. Uhen et al. (2023): Paleobiology Database User Guide Version 1.0 Free access, PaleoBios, 40: 1-56. See also here (in PDF).

The Paleobiology Database (PaleoBioDB): Organized and operated by a multi-disciplinary, multi-institutional, international group of paleobiological researchers.
The PaleobiologyPaleoBioDB is a non-governmental, non-profit public resource for paleontological data. Go to:
! PaleoBioDB API. The Paleobiology Database Application Programming Interface (API) gives access to taxonomic, spatial, and temporal data. See especially:
Navigator. Space, time and taxa.

! Palaeontologia Electronica: Fossil Calibration Database (project developed by the Working Group "Synthesizing and Databasing Fossil Calibrations: Divergence Dating and Beyond").
The mission of the Fossil Calibration Database is to provide vetted fossil calibration points that can be used for divergence dating by molecular systematists. The curated collection of well-justified calibrations also promote best practices for justifying fossil calibrations and citing calibrations properly. Raising the Standard in Fossil Calibration! See also:
D.T. Ksepka et al. (2015): The Fossil Calibration Database, A New Resource for Divergence Dating. Abstract, Systematic Biology.

! The Plant Fossil Names Registry (PFNR): Developed and maintained in the National Museum Prague since 2014 under the auspices of the International Organisation of Palaeobotany (IOP).
The Plant Fossil Names Registry is a database of names registering preferentially new, but also previously published names of plant fossils and associated nomenclatural acts.

! Allister Rees, Department of Geosciences, University of Arizona, Tucson: Databases. There are three databases (currently under construction):
PGAP (Paleogeographic Atlas Project Lithofacies Database). Mesozoic and Cenozoic Lithofacies: 45,000 locality entries distributed among 16 stage-length map intervals (2 Triassic, 3 Jurassic, 5 Cretaceous, 4 Tertiary, and 2 Quaternary) worldwide.
CSS (Climate Sensitive Sediments Database). Permian and Jurassic Climate Sensitive Sediments: 3,500 locality entries of oil source rocks, phosphorites, reefs, coals, evaporites, eolian sands and tillites worldwide.
DINO (Dinosauria Distributions Database). Triassic, Jurassic and Cretaceous Dinosaur Distributions: 4,200 taxon occurrence records from 1,200 localities worldwide.
Registration procedure required.

S.R. Schachat 2022): Examining paleobotanical databases: Revisiting trends in angiosperm folivory and unlocking the paleoecological promise of propensity score matching and specification curve analysis. Free access, Front. Ecol. Evol., 10: 951547. doi: 10.3389/fevo.2022.951547.
"... Long-term trends in the fossil record of plants, encompassing their interactions with herbivores and with the environment, are of the utmost relevance for predicting global change
[...] in contrast to modern ecology and unlike various other paleontological disciplines, paleobotany has a limited history of “big data” meta-analyses.
[...] Here I demonstrate the importance of analytical best practices by applying them to a recent meta-analysis of fossil angiosperms. ..."

ScienceDirect (Elsevier’s premier platform):
! Navigate from the concept definition and subject overview website.
Compiled information topic-by-topic. These pages are auto-generated by ScienceDirect using heuristic and machine-learning approaches to extract relevant information. Superbly done!
See for instance: ! Equisetaceae.

! Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History (supported by the Smithsonian Institution, IAPT, and the University of Utrecht, The Netherlands): Index Nominum Genericorum (ING). A compilation of generic names (including fossil plants!) published for organisms covered by the International Code of Botanical Nomenclature. The original intent of the ING was to bring all generic names of plants together in a single list to reveal homonymy between groups. Excellent! The database is constantly being revised as new information becomes available!

V. Teodoridis et al. (2011): The integrated plant record vegetation analysis: internet platform and online application. In PDF, Acta Musei Nationalis Pragae, Ser. B, 67: 159-165.

Torsten Utescher, Paleobotanical Workgroup, Lehrstuhl für Allgemeine Paläontologie, University of Tübingen: Palaeoflora Database. Palaeoflora provides information on Cenozoic plant taxa (macro and micro), corresponding Nearest Living Relatives, and their climate requirements. Palaeoflora data are used for palaeoclimate reconstructions from the palaeobotanical record using the Coexistence Approach (Mosbrugger and Utescher, 1997).

ViFaBio, The Virtual Library of Biology (University Library Johann Christian Senckenberg, Frankfurt/Main, Germany):
! Database Guide.

P. Wilf et al. (2021): An image dataset of cleared, x-rayed, and fossil leaves vetted to plant family for human and machine learning. Open access, PhytoKeys, 187: 93–128. Go to:
! Dataset (available from the Figshare Plus repository). Image collection and supporting data for: An image dataset of cleared, x-rayed, and fossil leaves vetted to plant family for human and machine learning.
See also:
From museum to laptop: Visual leaf library a new tool for identifying plants (by Matthew Carroll, March 15, 2022).
Penn State: From museum to laptop: Visual leaf library a new tool for identifying plants.

P. Wolniewicz (2009): Easily-accessible digital palaeontological databases - a new perspective for the storage of palaeontological information. Free access, Geologos, 15: 181-188.
"... In order to develop an easily accessible digital palaeontological database, three steps should be followed: (1) digitization of the studied specimens, (2) acquisition of morphometric data, and (3) contribution of the data to open and searchable geoinformatic (palaeontological) databases ..."

Yale Peabody Museum of Natural History, New Haven, Connecticut:
Paleobotany. Go to:
! Compendium Index of North American Paleobotany.
The Compendium Index presently covers fossil floras from North America, including Greenland, starting in the Triassic Period and extending to Pleistocene. This is a digitized version of a card-file index of approximately 20,000 images and text of descriptions of fossil plant species, maintained at Yale Peabody Museum of Natural History as a classification and identification tool.

J. Zhang et al. (2021): Database-based Eco-Plant analysis for Mesozoic dispersed sporomorphs. Open access, MethodsX, 8: 101329. e-ISSN 2215-0161.
Go to: J. Zhang: Sporopollen – a useful tool for Palynology.

J. Zhang, Technical University of Darmstadt, Germany: Sporopollen – a useful tool for Palynology.
Sporopollen is a database of Mesozoic sporomorphs to improve identification, stratigraphic analysis, and palaeoenvironmental reconstruction.