Plant metabarcoding, including analyzing environmental DNA, is currently not standardized, preventing high-throughput large-scale analyses. METAPLANTCODE harmonizes best practices for metabarcoding of plants collected across Europe to accelerate species monitoring and integrate biodiversity data. Existing pipelines for species identification are standardized and linked to reference databases. Best practices on FAIR data publishing will be incorporated in the GBIF and INSDC websites. ELIXIR-compatible DL-models will be implemented in novel tools. Species identification will be standardized through links with (inter)national checklists, red lists, floras, and Catalogue of Life. Literature will be semantically enriched with new entity recognition modules.

Trefpunt LiveScience organized low-threshold activities to engage and connect families with nature, science and biodiversity. Targeted at four disadvantaged neighborhoods in Leiden and Katwijk, where families of low socioeconomic status live for whom this involvement is not self-evident, Trefpunt LiveScience strove to reduce barriers to the scientific and museum world. Through collaboration with social organizations and key figures, a relation was built, which resulted in repeated and long-term visits to the many activities, opportunities for ideas and requests from the neighborhood and co-creation through which, among other things, photo exhibitions, neighborhood events and a exhibition showcase in Naturalis were realized.

Historical plant collections not only represent physical evidence of species’ occurrence at a particular time and place, they also shed light on the scientific interest of colonial powers and their search for economically promising plants during the last centuries. The treasure room of Naturalis houses a large bound book, containing some 200 dried plant specimens, collected by the German doctor and botanist Leonhard Rauwolff in Lebanon, Syria, Iraq, Kurdistan and Palestina from 1573 to 1574. On his long journey by horseback, camel and boat from Aleppo to Bagdad, Rauwolff described the natural vegetation along the Euphrates River, the vegetables and fruits grown in gardens and sold in city Bazars, and the spices and medicines transported by “Greeks, Armenians, Georgians, Arabians, Persians and Indians, which come and go daily with their caravans”. Although Rauwolffs travel account of his trip to the "Levant and Mesopotamia" became a bestseller, the herbarium and the associated, handwritten information on local plant names and uses has never been thoroughly studied. To capture the scientific value of the Rauwolff herbarium, we will identify all its specimens and translate the accompanying German texts. How do the plant species in the Rauwolff herbarium match with his botanical drawings and travel account? Are local names and plant uses documented in 1574 by Rauwolff still known in the Near East today? We expect that medicinal plants preserved in the herbarium are not represented as botanical drawings or discussed in the travel account, as they were collected for secret, commercial purposes. We further hypothesize that the ethnobotanical knowledge for cultivated species still exists in the Near East, but for the wild species it is probably lost. We will test our hypothesis by studying recent literature on plant use in the Near East. Once the plants are properly identified, the texts translated, and the digital images published online, this project will disclose a nearly 500-year old scientific masterpiece to botanists, historians of science, agriculture and pharmacy, ethnobotanists and historians of the Near East. In a time when Syria’s cultural artefacts are rapidly being destroyed, we feel the moral duty to make this unique cultural and natural history object digitally available to the public: not only to the scientific world, but also to the citizens of Syria and their diaspora. Ethnobotanical fieldwork will not be possible for the coming years in this region. The plant names and uses in the Rauwolff collections represent a multicultural society that no longer exists in Syria or its surroundings. This project will reveal a hidden part of the natural and cultural history of the Near East. To study the plants, vernacular names and uses in this unique ethnobotanical treasure, we would like to invite Dr. Abdolbaset Ghorbani Dahaneh, an Iranian ethnobotanist from Turkmen descent. He has ample research experience in ethnobotany in the Near East, an impressive publication record, and is fluent in German, Arab, Turkish, English and Persian. Dr. Ghorbani works currently at Uppsala University in a research project on Iranian orchid conservation.

Alien species can have large impacts on ecosystems but their impact on polar ecosystem processes is poorly researched and thus not well understood. Polar ecosystems, especially those in Antarctica, include some of the most simplified food webs on Earth with only a few key species driving ecosystem processes. They are sensitive and vulnerable to invasion, with alien species likely to quickly seizing key roles and affect ecosystem functioning. Furthermore, established alien species may facilitate further establishment of others thereby creating a cascade of alien impacts, introducing novel traits for the ecosystem, and further changing these unique polar habitats. Although Arctic food webs are often more complex, similar principles apply, and potential impacts on ecosystem functioning are fundamental. Arctic tundra support massive soil carbon pools, whose mineralisation and release could be enhanced when aliens with novel traits invade. The aim of this study is to quantify impacts of alien vascular plants and mosses on ecosystem processes in the polar regions. In addition, we will assess the effect of climate warming on these alien impacts, and that of ‘invasion engineers’ that can facilitate alien establishment. This work will be achieved through a combination of laboratory and field translocation experiments utilising climate gradients along elevation. This robust comparison of the response of Arctic and Antarctic ecosystems to alien invasions will be one of the first to analyze in detail the impact of alien species on polar ecosystem functioning and service provision.

Er bestaat kansenongelijkheid als het gaat om de toegankelijkheid van de wetenschap; de toegankelijkheid van wetenschappelijke kennis via wetenschapscommunicatie en daaraan gerelateerd de toegankelijkheid van de wetenschap als beroepsperspectief. Het Museon, Natura Docet Wonderryck Twente, Natuurmuseum Fryslân, Naturalis, Hogeschool Leiden en de VSC (Vereniging van wetenschapsmusea en science centers) willen daarom werk maken van een meer inclusieve wetenschapscommunicatie en wetenschap door in meerdere regio’s in het land geheel nieuwe wetenschapsclubs op te richten, verbonden aan een lokaal geactiveerd ‘leerecosysteem’, gericht op ‘kansarme’ kinderen. Zij worden wekelijks verrast en uitgedaagd om hun wetenschappelijke talenten te ontwikkelen. Het bereiken van deze nieuwe doelgroep vraagt om een werkelijk toegankelijke en inclusieve wetenschapscommunicatie. Dit is een grote maatschappelijke uitdaging. Het oprichten van de clubs gaat daarom middels een iteratief ontwikkelingsproces in een ‘community of practice’ (COP). In een COP werken professionals en onderzoekers stap voor stap samen aan de opbouw van de club, waarbij systematisch wordt beoordeeld hoe de de clubs inclusievere wetenschap kunnen versterken. Het handelen wordt hier steeds op afgestemd.