The Biological Collection Access Service for Europe, BioCASE, is a transnational network of biological collections of all kinds. BioCASE enables widespread unified access to distributed and heterogeneous European collection and observational databases using open-source, system-independent software and open data standards and protocols.

Please report any comments or problems regarding the service or data provided on our user feedback system.

Quality control of the information accessed by BioCASe is the responsibility of the data providers and national nodes. If you encounter any problems with the quality of the information please notify us.




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General information

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» Set preferences

You can set your preferred language, the default preview , and the information you would like to see on result pages.
Check the boxes you are interested in, and save your preferences by clicking on 'Save preferences'.




Unit search

» Simple search

simple search
Fill the text area with the scientific name you are looking for. Use '*' for wildcard searching. For example, "dracunc*" will search for all units whose name begins with dracunc.
Then, click on the 'Search' button or press 'Enter'.





» Advanced search

advanced search
You can fill in any of the following fields to assist in your query:
Use '*' for wildcard searching.
Separate multiple entries within a field with " OR ".


You can refine your search to a specific kind of record basis by checking the box 'Only records based on' and selecting a field.
You can refine your search to only those units having multimedia content by checking the box 'Multimedia'.
The list 'Sort results by' enables you to choose which data will be first displayed on the Preview page.
Important: You must enter at least one of the following fields: taxonName-commonName-family-genus-collector-locality-fieldNumber-collectorNumber-unitID.
Start your query with 'Search'




Results

The results are displayed in 3 main steps which make it possible to refine the query.

» Preview

This page displays the results matching your query in terms of names.
prelim results

In the scientific names column, you can extend your query for the selected names using the Thesaurus Service, by checking the boxes and clicking on 'Expanded search'.
You can refine your query: Click on one of the following buttons and wait for the list.
Please use select/deselect button.
You can combine all filters or remove filters and change your filtering.
Once you have refined your query, select the boxes you are interested in and click 'Get units'; you will be redirected to the
Results page
Note: if your selection corresponds to more than 10 000 units, an alert will be displayed.
alert
You will have to refine your query again in order to access the Results page. Nevertheless, you can download the data stored in our local database for these units.




» Results

This page displays the results matching your query in terms of units.
Results

You can set the displayed columns (like collector, country, locality, record basis) under 'preferences'.
Check the boxes you are interested in, and save your preferences by clicking on 'Save preferences'.
To order each column by name, in ascending or descending order, click on the arrows
In order to see the details from the original providers for the units of your choice, check the boxes and click on 'See the details for the selected units'.
You can download the details by clicking on ' Download the details for the selected units'.
If you are only interested in one unit, just click on its name. You will be redirected to its full details.

If you download data from several units, this action can take a considerable amount of time.
Follow the instructions to continue the download. An anti-spam system is used to prevent abuse from bots - don't forget to write the image's content in the text area and click "Validate" to proceed.
dlConfirmation




» Details

This page displays the full details from the provider for the selected unit(s).
Details
You can see/download the XML data from the original provider and /or download all data as Excel-file.
Note: if the provider is out of service, you will only get the details stored in our cache database; annotation and downloading will not be available. After your registration, you can annotate the current data.




Other services

» Thesaurus Service : the Expanded Search

The thesaurus-interface serves the following purposes: For example, the concepts returned for "Dracunculus*" are "Dracunculus, Helicodiceros crinitus, Dracunculus crinitus, Arum muscivorum, Helicodiceros muscivorus, Arum dracunculus"
Semantic relations are : When you click on "Expanded search", it searches for all concepts for the selected term.
Then, for each concept, it searches for all semantically related concepts, for the 6 relations.
This list of concepts is handled as a list of taxonomic names : finally, it searches in our database all available data for this list.

expanded

Search example

Two kinds of search are available on the EDIT specimen and observation explorer for taxonomists: a simple search and an advanced search. The simple search makes it possible to search for units (collection and observational data) by entering a Latin name. The primary term used by the advanced search can be a scientific name, a vernacular name, a family, a genus, a collector name, a locality, a field number, a collector number or a unit ID (catalogue number). Both search types can be combined with a query extension.




Full search example
Two kinds of search are available on the EDIT specimen and observation explorer for taxonomists: a simple search and an advanced search. The simple search makes it possible to search for units (collection and observational data) by entering a Latin name. The primary term used by the advanced search can be a scientific name, a vernacular name, a family, a genus, a collector name, a locality, a field number, a collector number or a unit ID (catalogue number). Both search types can be combined with a query extension.