MATERIALS

This section describes the key functionalities of the eBioDiv Matching Service that is used for linking material citations to specimens. 

To facilitate the task, a semi-automatic matching approach is used. Users are presented with lists of possible matches. Once a sufficient number of matching decisions have been recorded by the users of the eBioDiv Matching Service, it will be possible to start exploring ways of gradually replacing the current semi-automatic matching approach with a fully automatic matching algorithm for data pairs with a sufficient number of data points of score high enough to warrant automatic acceptance of a match.

Furthermore, it might become possible to automatically sort out data entries that are clearly deficient and therefore unfit as an input for matching decisions. These data entries could then be relegated back to the maintainers of the data along with a request to improve the data.

As a result, fewer matching suggestions will have to be curated by humans. It will be interesting to observe how the intellectual work carried out by the users of the eBioDiv Matching Service will evolve as a result of this shift in the balance between the tasks relegated to computer algorithms and the tasks remaining with human contributors.

If you want to contribute to the realization of this vision please refer to the following documentation to get an introduction to the matching process and to get access to detailed documentation related to the use of the Matching Service.

	Figure 1. The eBioDiv Matching Service Interface.

For new users it is highly recommended to have a close look at the following documentation to get an introduction to the matching process:

• Introduction to the Matching Service
  
• Data Source
  
• Matching Algorithm
  

For advanced users, the key steps of the process are described in the following documentation:

• Matching Service Introduction
• Getting Started
• Accessing the Matching Service
• Matching Specimens with Material Citations
• Matching Decisions
• Link_Glossary to the Matching Service

Here is a detailed Tutorial for using the eBioDiv Matching Service.