The Global Biodiversity Information Facility (GBIF) is an open-data global research infrastructure for sharing biodiversity data. The NBN is the UK node for GBIF and, with the permission of the individual data partners, we share NBN Atlas datasets with GBIF.
The benefit of sharing data with GBIF is that it vastly increases the number of people who will find and possibly use the data. GBIF assigns each dataset a DOI (Digital Object Identifier), which is a unique identifier for the dataset. When datasets are cited in publications, GBIF stores the citation against the DOI and passes this information back to the NBN Atlas. Citations for a dataset are listed on the dataset page.
Citations are a valuable way of demonstrating the importance of sharing biodiversity data. We encourage all data partners to allow us to share their data with GBIF. If anyone is unsure whether their data is being shared or would like to share their data, please email data@nbn.org.uk.