A solution to the challenges of interdisciplinary aggregation and use of specimen-level trait data

Meghan A Balk; John Deck; Kitty F Emery; Ramona L Walls; Dana Reuter; Raphael LaFrance; Joaquín Arroyo-Cabrales; Paul Barrett; Jessica Blois; Arianne Boileau; Laura Brenskelle; Nicole R Cannarozzi; J Alberto Cruz; Liliana M Dávalos; Noé U de la Sancha; Prasiddhi Gyawali; Maggie M Hantak; Samantha Hopkins; Brooks Kohli; Jessica N King; Michelle S Koo; A Michelle Lawing; Helena Machado; Samantha M McCrane; Bryan McLean; Michèle E Morgan; Suzanne Pilaar Birch; Denne Reed; Elizabeth J Reitz; Neeka Sewnath; Nathan S Upham; Amelia Villaseñor; Laurel Yohe; Edward B Davis; Robert P Guralnick

doi:10.1016/j.isci.2022.105101

A solution to the challenges of interdisciplinary aggregation and use of specimen-level trait data

iScience. 2022 Sep 13;25(10):105101. doi: 10.1016/j.isci.2022.105101. eCollection 2022 Oct 21.

Authors

Meghan A Balk^{1

2}, John Deck^{3

4}, Kitty F Emery⁵, Ramona L Walls^{6

7}, Dana Reuter⁸, Raphael LaFrance⁵, Joaquín Arroyo-Cabrales⁹, Paul Barrett⁸, Jessica Blois¹⁰, Arianne Boileau¹¹, Laura Brenskelle¹², Nicole R Cannarozzi⁵, J Alberto Cruz⁹, Liliana M Dávalos¹³, Noé U de la Sancha^{14

15}, Prasiddhi Gyawali¹⁶, Maggie M Hantak⁵, Samantha Hopkins^{8

17}, Brooks Kohli¹⁸, Jessica N King⁵, Michelle S Koo¹⁹, A Michelle Lawing²⁰, Helena Machado⁸, Samantha M McCrane²¹, Bryan McLean²², Michèle E Morgan²³, Suzanne Pilaar Birch^{24

25}, Denne Reed²⁶, Elizabeth J Reitz²⁷, Neeka Sewnath¹², Nathan S Upham²⁸, Amelia Villaseñor²⁹, Laurel Yohe³⁰, Edward B Davis^{8

18}, Robert P Guralnick⁵

Affiliations

¹ National Ecology Observatory Network, Battelle, Boulder, CO 80301, USA.
² Smithsonian Institution, National Museum of Natural History, Washington, DC 20560, USA.
³ Berkeley Natural History Museums, University of California, Berkeley, Berkeley, CA 94720, USA.
⁴ Biocode LLC, Junction City, OR 97448, USA.
⁵ Florida Museum of Natural History, University of Florida, Gainesville, FL 32611, USA.
⁶ Critical Path Institute, Tucson, AZ 85718, USA.
⁷ BIO5 Institute, University of Arizona, Tucson, AZ 85719, USA.
⁸ Department of Earth Sciences, University of Oregon, Eugene, OR 97403, USA.
⁹ Archaeozoology Lab, Instituto Nacional de Antropologia e Historia, 06060 Mexico City, CdMx, Mexico.
¹⁰ Department of Life and Environmental Sciences, University of California, Merced, Merced, CA 95343, USA.
¹¹ Department of Archaeology, Simon Fraser University, Burnaby, BC V5A 1S6, Canada.
¹² Department of Biology, University of Florida, Gainesville, FL 32611, USA.
¹³ Stony Brook University, Stony Brook, NY 11794, USA.
¹⁴ Department of Environmental Science and Studies, DePaul University, Chicago, IL 60614, USA.
¹⁵ Negaunee Integrative Research Center, The Field Museum of Natural History, Chicago, IL 60605, USA.
¹⁶ College of Science, University of Arizona, Tucson, AZ 85721, USA.
¹⁷ Museum of Natural and Cultural History, University of Oregon, Eugene, OR 97401, USA.
¹⁸ Department of Biology and Chemistry, Morehead State University, Morehead, KY 40351, USA.
¹⁹ Museum of Vertebrate Zoology, University of California, Berkeley, Berkeley, CA 94720, USA.
²⁰ Department of Ecology and Conservation Biology, Texas A&M University, College Station, TX 77843, USA.
²¹ Department of Anthropology, University of Florida, Gainesville, FL 32611, USA.
²² Department of Biology, University of North Carolina, Greensboro, NC 27412, USA.
²³ Peabody Museum of Archaeology and Ethnology, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA 02138, USA.
²⁴ Department of Anthropology, University of Georgia, Athens, GA 30602, USA.
²⁵ Department of Geography, University of Georgia, Athens, GA 30602, USA.
²⁶ Department of Anthropology, University of Texas, Austin, Austin, TX 78712, USA.
²⁷ Georgia Museum of Natural History, University of Georgia, Athens, GA 30602, USA.
²⁸ School of Life Sciences, Arizona State University, Tempe, AZ 85281, USA.
²⁹ Department of Anthropology, University of Arkansas, Fayetteville, AR 72701, USA.
³⁰ Department of Bioinformatics and Genomics, University of North Carolina Charlotte, Charlotte, NC 28223, USA.

Abstract

Understanding variation of traits within and among species through time and across space is central to many questions in biology. Many resources assemble species-level trait data, but the data and metadata underlying those trait measurements are often not reported. Here, we introduce FuTRES (Functional Trait Resource for Environmental Studies; pronounced few-tress), an online datastore and community resource for individual-level trait reporting that utilizes a semantic framework. FuTRES already stores millions of trait measurements for paleobiological, zooarchaeological, and modern specimens, with a current focus on mammals. We compare dynamically derived extant mammal species' body size measurements in FuTRES with summary values from other compilations, highlighting potential issues with simply reporting a single mean estimate. We then show that individual-level data improve estimates of body mass-including uncertainty-for zooarchaeological specimens. FuTRES facilitates trait data integration and discoverability, accelerating new research agendas, especially scaling from intra- to interspecific trait variability.

Keywords: Animals; Biological database; Evolutionary history; Ornithology; Paleobiology; Phylogenetics; Systematics.