How iBOL Works
About the People and Organizations Involved
The International Barcode of Life (iBOL) project is the largest biodiversity genomics initiative ever undertaken. It involves hundreds of scientists and technicians from 26 countries in a global campaign that is using DNA barcode technology to create a reference library for all multi-cellular life. Within the next five years, iBOL collaborators will gather DNA barcodes from five million specimens representing 500,000 species.
The research and administrative activities of iBOL are organized under five Themes and 20 Working Groups. iBOL is structured as a not-for-profit corporation governed by its Board of Directors which has final decision making authority over all aspects of the project.
The Board has appointed a Scientific Advisory Board, a group of independent experts which makes recommendations to the Board on scientific matters.
A Scientific Steering Committee comprising representatives from each iBOL nation and the head of each iBOL Working Group assists and advises the Scientific Director on overall research plans and deliverables.
The iBOL Secretariat, the administrative headquarters for the project, is hosted by the Biodiversity Institute of Ontario at the University of Guelph.
The research and collection work of the iBOL Working Groups is augmented by various barcoding campaigns – self-organized groups of barcoding practitioners brought together by a common interest in a particular taxonomic group, biological zone or other specialized area of research.
