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Introduction
This project aims to describe symbiotic interactions between protists and prokaryotes as Linked Open Data. Information in the database is compiled from the scientific literature; over 500 symbiotic interactions described in 300 scientific publications are represented at present. The database is hosted on Wikibase Cloud, a hosting service for Wikibase instances provided by Wikimedia Deutschland.
What can the database be used for?
- Search and browse symbiotic interactions by biological taxonomy, leveraging cross-references to external taxonomies and databases
- Find interactions that were described in earlier literature but not yet studied with modern methods
- Programatically find sequence data, literature, etc. by querying the NCBI databases using linked NCBI taxon IDs
- Share data with GloBI through periodic data exports
What information do we wish to capture about symbiotic interactions?
| Information | Relevant database or ontology |
|---|---|
| Taxonomy of interacting organisms | NCBI Taxonomy, Wikidata |
| Localization of symbionts in host organism | Gene Ontology, Uberon |
| Nature of biotic interactions, if known/inferred | Relation Ontology |
| Analytical methods used to identify organisms or interaction type | OBI, Evidence Ontology |
| Environment where organisms were isolated | Environment Ontology |
Terms will be linked to other linked open data or ontologies, if there is a suitable exact match. The EMBL-EBI Ontology Lookup Service is a useful resource for browsing life science related ontologies.
This project originated as part of my doctoral dissertation (2017).
Similar projects elsewhere:
- Global Biotic Interactions (GloBI), an aggregator for biotic interactions datasets across all domains of life
- Protist Interaction Database (PIDA), Bjorbækmo et al., 2019 (last updated 2018)
- Diatom Interaction Database (DIDB) (last updated 2019)
Documentation of the workflow and project administration is linked from Project:Main.
Explore the data
Some example entries to see how the data are modeled:
- Parduczia sp. from Santa Barbara Basin ("brown ciliate"), a marine ciliate
- Pelomyxa palustris, a freshwater amoebozoan
- Mixotricha paradoxa, itself a hint gut symbiont of the termite Mastotermes darwiniensis
- Candidatus Megaira polyxenophila, a bacterial endosymbiont of a diverse array of protists and algae
Each interaction statement is supported by one or more references to the scientific literature, linked by their DOI if available.
Use the Query Service (link on menu bar) to launch SPARQL queries; try the example queries to get started.
Q & A
- Which types of interactions are in the scope of this database?
- Interactions between protists (microbial eukaryotes) and prokaryotes (bacteria and archaea). In a few cases, interactions between two eukaryotic partners, or interactions with viruses, may also be included if they occur in organisms that also participate in protist-prokaryote interactions.
- Fungi and macroalgae are generally not included, as are microbiome studies. Reports of putative symbionts described solely by morphology without further phylogenetic characterization may be included if the host organism is somehow notable, or if they are in older literature about host taxa that have not yet been studied with modern methods.
- Why use a single 'interacts with' statement, with qualifiers for interaction type, instead of different properties for each interaction type?
- The nature of an interaction is often not fully understood, or may have multiple facets. Coding interaction types as qualifiers allows us to stack multiple functional roles on a single interaction
- Why host this on Wikibase?
- This database has seen a number of iterations: starting as a table in a word processor file, to spreadsheets, a custom SQLite database, and an attempt to homebrew a structured data base with XML files and Python scripts. After getting some experience on Wikidata, I found that Wikibase offers the key features that I wanted: flexible and extensible schemata, graphical frontend for manual data entry, options for programmatic data import from tables, integration with external databases, and a sophisticated query interface.
- What is the beautiful organism depicted in the logo?
- Kentrophoros sp. H
- (The logo may not be visible in the mobile version of this site.)