habitats
annotation overview
About our EnvO-Lite annotation
A project of the Genomic Standards Consortium (GSC), Habitat-Lite (or EnvO-Lite) aims to create an intuitive and easily implemented subset of terms present in the Environment Ontology project (EnvO). EnvO provides a controlled and structured vocabulary with defined relationships between its terms allowing efficient and accurate software manipulation, data retrieval and integration.
Here at megx.net, the 20 terms proposed in EnvO-Lite Revision 1.4 were used in a manual classification of the microbial genome projects present in the August 2009 update of the Genomes OnLine Database (GOLD). Terms were assigned based on the isolation source of the biological sample in question. Please note: only GOLD entries with NCBI Genome Project IDs are displayed on this site. The complete annotation is available on request.
Isolation and habitat descriptors in GOLD and culture collection archives such as the American Type Culture Collection and the German Collection of Microorganisms and Cell Cultures, were used to guide the assignments. When necessary, further literature searches were performed to identify the organisms' isolation environment.
EnvO-Lite is by no means comprehensive or a substitute for quantitative metadata; however, it successfully distinguishes between broad, qualitative features of sampling sites and reasserts the (macro)environmental aspect of ecology. Furthermore, it provides a straightforward and approachable terminology for database annotators and end-users. Continuing dialogue between ontologists, biologists and computer scientists will further the development of the EnvO-Lite project based on the community's need for habitat-specific terms and the results of further case studies.