standardization of environmental data and information - International ...

would have their own animals labeled species A. The coordinator – “central
management” sounded authoritarian – would have the job of overseeing
this work, to ensure that the contractors did not end up with different
voucher collections.
One speaker, concerned about the declining numbers of
taxonomists, said the new programmes being envisaged pointed to the
need to train young scientists. A coordinating group could help with this
problem. As another participant put it, the new assessment tasks
generated by seabed activities could accelerate the desperation of
taxonomists. A third speaker observed that this was the responsibility of
the scientific community in all countries and not of the Authority.
Smith agreed that having a coordinating taxonomist would facilitate
the training of scientists in other countries. It would also benefit
environmental studies on mining impacts, deep-sea biology in general and
the scientific culture in the contractors’ countries.
Molecular biology
Asking about the new technique of DNA analysis, a participant
wondered whether traditional taxonomists would disappear once easier and
accurate methods came into play. Smith replied that, for a group like the
polychaetes, it was important to use both approaches. A huge knowledge
base rested on traditional taxonomy. Since what scientists thought they
knew about evolution was based on the traditional methods, that whole
approach could not just be thrown out. The molecular approaches and
classical, morphologically based taxonomy had to be combined.
Another participant remarked that John Lambshead, in his
presentation (chapter 16 above), had talked about molecular methods in
relation to the meiofauna. For the hundred or so macrofaunal individuals
that came out of an abyssal box core, it would be more efficient to sort them
to species without applying molecular methods. Lambshead, confirming
that he had referred specifically to nematodes in this connection, said it
was the task of museums, as part of their scientific obligations, to calibrate
the old taxonomy with the new, a problem about which the contractors need
not be concerned.
Another speaker observed that molecular biology was the only way
to understand the diversity of bacteria, the primary consumers of the
INTERNATIONAL SEABED AUTHORITY 463