About the International Society for Biocuration

The International Society for Biocuration (“Société internationale d’annotation” in French) was legally incorporated in 2009 in Switzerland as a non-for-profit organization.

What is biocuration?

Biocuration involves the translation and integration of information relevant to biology into a database or resource that enables integration of the scientific literature as well as large data sets. Accurate and comprehensive representation of biological knowledge, as well as easy access to this data for working scientists and a basis for computational analysis, are primary goals of biocuration.

The goals of biocuration are achieved thanks to the convergent endeavors of biocurators, software developers and researchers in bioinformatics. Biocurators provide essential resources to the biological community such that databases have become an integral part of the tools researchers use on a daily basis for their work.

More information on biocuration can be found in the article “Big data: The future of biocuration.” (PubMed; full text at Nature.com).

Mission of the ISB

The mission of the International Society for Biocuration is to:

Help define the profession of biocuration with respect to the scientific community and the granting agencies.
Provide a forum for biocurators, and interested developers, researchers, and students to exchange experience and ideas. The current website, biocurator.org, will be extended to provide user profiles, including databases, research interests, and curation expertise.
Organize regular conference where biocurators present their work and discuss their scholarly efforts.
Lobby to obtain increased and stable funding for resources that are essential to research.
Build a relationship with publishers and establish a link between researchers and databases through the journal publishers.
Organize workshops where new biocurators, or interested students can be trained in the use of common tools such as the Gene Ontology, Genotype and Phenotype curation, GMOD tools, etc..
Provide documentation on the use of common database tools.
Provide gold standards for databases, such as the use of unique, traceable identifiers, use of shared tools, etc..
Share documentation on standards, annotation procedures with the aim of developing standard operating procedures.
Foster connections with user communities to ensure that the databases and accompanying tools meet specific user needs.
Maintain a biocurator job market forum.