[Taxacom] How many species have been reported only once

[David Patterson]

Rod et al.

Neither uBio nor BHL have any taxonomic authority.  While I think the number of names that are encountered once is of itself interesting, that isn't what I wanted. 

 The proportion of species now exposed through BHL (and other literature digitization projects) may be estimated by the proportion of BHL names in uBio or better GNI (it has over 18 million). That makes Chris' 22%  an interesting number as a guesstimate. 

I think we need to register Jim's point, that many 'once only' taxa appear many times in the literature because they will be referred to within reviews.  So, that would suggest the Chris number is an underestimate.

There is a correlate, which is that some of the 'once only' will be typographic errors and have nothing to do with taxonomic entities ... hence my earlier point.  So, if these have made their way into uBio, and they have, they will tend to inflate the number I am looking for.

Peter's number is particularly valuable as it has solidity.

On the basis of this input, I don't think we can say much beyond - perhaps 10-20% but if anything that will be an under-estimate.

I suspect the issue when applied to fossil taxa (Sara's point) will need to be differently reflected on because the fossil biota is much less well sampled (total number of fossil taxa being about one tenth total number of living (described) taxa)  leading to an extension of the long tail.  That is, I would expect the proportion of 'once only' fossil taxa to be higher than 'once-only' living taxa.

Thanks all

PAddy

----- Original Message -----
From: "Roderic Page" <r.page at bio.gla.ac.uk>
To: "David Patterson" <dpatterson at eol.org>, "Chris Freeland" <Chris.Freeland at mobot.org>
Cc: taxacom at mailman.nhm.ku.edu
Sent: Friday, March 19, 2010 4:58:32 PM GMT -05:00 US/Canada Eastern
Subject: Re: [Taxacom] How many species have  been reported only once

Paddy, wouldn't a quick and dirty way to answer this be to use BHL to  
build a  frequency distribution of uBio names over BHL items? If info  
only in original description then name will typically occur in only  
one item. Might have to exclude some items (e.g. compations and  
indices), but it would give you a ball park figure.

Rod

Sent from my iPhone

On 19 Mar 2010, at 19:13, David Patterson <dpatterson at eol.org> wrote:

> I have heard suggestions that our understanding of 50% and 65% of  
> all species is limited to the information that was included in the  
> original description.  That is, for very many species, there have  
> not been any further publications that add new information. These  
> are the 'once only' species.  If the proportion is as high as this,  
> it bears upon the reliability and effectiveness of the discovery  
> process, how many species there are, and on asymmetry within our  
> discipline.
>
> Does anyone know of analyses that explore this matter, or have any  
> data to confirm the proportion of 'once only' species in their  
> sphere of expertise?
>
> Thanks
>
> David Patterson
>
> -- 
> David J Patterson
> Senior Taxonomist, EOL
> CoPI Life Sciences, Data Conservancy
>
> Biodiversity Informatics
> Marine Biological Laboratory
> Woods Hole, Massachusetts 02543, USA.
>
> (+) (1) 508 289 7260
> dpatterson at mbl.edu
>
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-- 
David J Patterson
Senior Taxonomist, EOL
CoPI Life Sciences, Data Conservancy

Biodiversity Informatics
Marine Biological Laboratory
Woods Hole, Massachusetts 02543, USA.

(+) (1) 508 289 7260
dpatterson at mbl.edu