In cboettig/taxadb: A High-Performance Local Taxonomic Database Interface

We are submitting our manuscript titled “taxadb: A High-Performance Local Taxonomic Database Interface” to be considered for publication as an Application in Methods in Ecology and Evolution.

Tracking and reconciling changes in taxonomy across time and between datasets is a core but often overlooked challenge in Ecology and Evolutionary biology. As combining larger and larger datasets becomes increasingly common, the potential for serious species mismatches has important implications for the scientific conclusions drawn. While multiple efforts to standardize taxonomic data exist and and some tools to access those providers have been developed, it remains difficult to resolve names to a taxonomic authority in quick, reproducible way. Here we present a new R package for accessing taxonomic data using infrastructure that enables easy incorporation of taxonomic data to existing workflows and further exploration of the taxonomic providers. With our software it is possible to resolve hundreds of names in under a second making taxonomic resolution realistic for large datasets for the first time. This package was reviewed and accepted by rOpenSci and can be found at www.github.com/ropensci/taxadb.

cboettig/taxadb documentation built on April 17, 2024, 6:34 p.m.