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Introducing the World List of Octocorallia, a companion to the World Lists of Actiniaria and Scleractinia
Added on 2025-06-02 10:35:28 by Vandepitte, Leen
Today is the launch day for the World List of Octocorallia, a Global Species Database under the umbrella of the World Register of Marine Species (WoRMS). Octocorallia is a diverse group of anthozoan cnidarians encompassing 3,675 species (May 2025) of soft corals, sea fans, sea whips, sea pens and blue corals that are foundational species in ecological communities from the deep sea to shallow tropical reefs. We hope the World List of Octocorallia will provide one-stop shopping for information about the taxonomy and biodiversity of this ecologically important but understudied group.
The taxonomic/systematic backbone of the World List of Octocorallia is now largely complete and continually updated by three volunteer editors for Recent taxa and one for fossil taxa. Over time, the database will also incorporate a growing amount of trait data, validated geographic distributions, documentation of type material and more.
The World List of Octocorallia is designed to complement the existing World List of Actiniaria and World List of Scleractinia, both of which originated with Hexacorallians of the World, a database founded and curated by the late Daphne Fautin.
The Data Management Team (DMT) is supported by LifeWatch Belgium, part of the E-Science European LifeWatch Infrastructure for Biodiversity and Ecosystem Research. LifeWatch is a distributed virtual laboratory, used for different aspects of biodiversity research. The Species Information Backbone of LifeWatch aims at bringing together taxonomic and species-related data and at filling the gaps in our knowledge.
Image: Iridogorgia (Courtesy of the NOAA Okeanos Explorer Program)
The taxonomic/systematic backbone of the World List of Octocorallia is now largely complete and continually updated by three volunteer editors for Recent taxa and one for fossil taxa. Over time, the database will also incorporate a growing amount of trait data, validated geographic distributions, documentation of type material and more.
The World List of Octocorallia is designed to complement the existing World List of Actiniaria and World List of Scleractinia, both of which originated with Hexacorallians of the World, a database founded and curated by the late Daphne Fautin.
The Data Management Team (DMT) is supported by LifeWatch Belgium, part of the E-Science European LifeWatch Infrastructure for Biodiversity and Ecosystem Research. LifeWatch is a distributed virtual laboratory, used for different aspects of biodiversity research. The Species Information Backbone of LifeWatch aims at bringing together taxonomic and species-related data and at filling the gaps in our knowledge.
Image: Iridogorgia (Courtesy of the NOAA Okeanos Explorer Program)
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