Russian Biodiversity Collections: A Professional Opinion Survey

• Published in: Animals (Basel) Vol. 13; no. 24; p. 3777
• Main Authors: Alpeeva, Elena V, Sharova, Natalia P, Sharov, Konstantin S, Vorotelyak, Ekaterina A
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Switzerland MDPI AG 01.12.2023
• Subjects: Artificial intelligence; biobank; Biobanks; Biodiversity; biodiversity centre; biodiversity collection; biological conservation; Biological diversity; Domestication; Ecology; Ecosystems; Endangered & extinct species; Endangered species; Epidemics; Extinction; Morphology; Nonnative species; Poultry; Protection and preservation; Research institutes; Wildlife conservation; wildlife restoration; Russia; Southeast Asia; extinction; biodiversity centre; wildlife restoration; biological conservation; endangered species; biodiversity collection; biobank
• ISSN: 2076-2615; 2076-2615
• DOI: 10.3390/ani13243777

Biodiversity collections are important vehicles for protecting endangered wildlife in situations of adverse anthropogenic influence. In Russia, there are currently a number of institution- and museum-based biological collections, but there are no nation-wide centres of biodiversity collections. In this paper, we report on the results of our survey of 324 bioconservation, big-data, and ecology specialists from different regions of Russia in regard to the necessity to create several large national biodiversity centres of wildlife protection. The survey revealed specific goals that have to be fulfilled during the development of these centres for the protection and restoration of endangered wildlife species. The top three problems/tasks (topics) are the following: (1) the necessity to create large national centres for different types of specimens; (2) the full sequencing and creation of different "omic" (genomic, proteomic, transcriptomic, etc.) databases; (3) full digitisation of a biodiversity collection/centre. These goals may constitute a guideline for the future of biodiversity collections in Russia that would be targeted at protecting and restoring endangered species. With the due network service level, the translation of the website into English, and permission from the regulator (Ministry of Science and Higher Education of Russian Federation), it can also become an international project.