Dear All
In today's digital age, computers are everywhere where Zoology is no exception. Besides the general-purpose use of computers by Zoologists in their officies, there are specialized technologies such as GIS that are extensively used in field- and research-related activities.
Could you please name some computer-based tools (hardware and/or software) that Zoologists use in their field- and research-related activities. The aim is to equip my students from Department of Zoology with state of the art tools for their current and future projects.
Kind Regards
Irfan
Hello Iran; I'm a field biologist and GIS is an essential part of nearly every project. I'd be dead in the water without the expertise of one of my collaborators.
You are to be complimented for keeping your program current. Best regards, Jim Des Lauriers
Certainly GIS. Some very basic introduction to coding in R, python (doing simple calculations, basic indices) would help them a great deal in future. Otherwise it's just too much later.
There are very many softwares we are expected to use, so it could be a lot for students. But what I think would be really cool, is the culture and ease of using a software, students need to see using technology as problem solving rather than stressing about it.
Dear Irfan,
I am a neuroethologist that spends a great deal of time in the lab and in the field. Other than GIS technology, one of the most basic needs of a field biologist is to know what animal or plant you are studying. There are many specialized databases that can provide immense help with identifying species. The one we use most (since we study amphibians) is called AmphibiaWeb (https://amphibiaweb.org/index.html). AmphibiaWeb provides information on amphibian declines, natural history, conservation and taxonomy.
From the website: "AmphibiaWeb is an online resource for anyone to search and retrieve information on amphibian biology, taxonomy, and conservation. We were motivated by the alarming global declines of amphibians, the study of which has been hindered by the lack of multidisciplinary studies and a lack of coordination in monitoring, in field studies, and in lab studies. We hope AmphibiaWeb will encourage a shared vision to collaboratively face the challenge of global amphibian declines and the conservation of remaining amphibians and their habitats."
Hope this helps.
Peter
Thank you very much for the valuable information. I came across "Digital Zoology." Any comments ...
Hello Irfan,
Concerning computer based taxonomy, you have a few projects available online.
I believe, in Europ, the most important one is the European Distributed Institute of Taxonomy (Edit).
The website is there: https://cybertaxonomy.eu/
Regards
Frederic
Hi Irfan,
There was a recent thread on Twitter by Jaclyn Siegel that includes many free online programs that may be of use to you and your Zoology students: https://threader.app/thread/1237342357743382528
Here are a few of the most relevant online programs from the thread and some specific ones for zoological research from myself:
1) Google Drive: Free data storage and writing programs.
https://www.google.com/drive/
2) R, R Studio, and R for data science: Free statistical software, a user-friendly GUI, and free tutorials.
https://www.r-project.org/
https://rstudio.com/
https://r4ds.had.co.nz/
3) SciHub: Access to peer-reviewed literature (google it).
4) Morphosource: Free digital anatomical data and images.
https://www.morphosource.org/
5) iDigBio: Free digitized biodiversity data.
https://www.idigbio.org/
6) iNaturalist: Free app for documenting biodiversity.
https://www.inaturalist.org/
7) GBIF: Free biodiversity data
https://www.gbif.org/
I hope some of these are helpful and best of luck!
Best,
Danny
Hello Irfan; Since we've gotten hooked on taxon databases here are three that deal with the world's ants. They are expertly curated, free and user-friendly.
Best, Jim Des Lauriers
https://antmaps.org/?
https://www.antwiki.org/wiki/Welcome_to_AntWiki
https://www/antweb.org
Dear Dr. Irfan Ullah besides other statistical and reference manager software, I would like to suggest a Software named "Image J". This has a lot of features, for instance, measuring various immunoexpression, counting of cells, measuring relative distance between two points, measurement of various parts of insects and parasites.
Tthañks Ajmal Khan for this valuable addition. It has several nice features:
https://imagej.nih.gov/ij/features.html
Hi Dr. Irfan Ullah when it comes to statistical software, I have found that GUI packages such as PAST, JAMOVI and JASP are better at doing the basics. PAST especially makes calculating diversity indices (alpha and beta) much easier. Once more complicated analyses are required, moving to R is a good option. But it is a preference (I don't like wasting time on coding when there is work to be done).
I have also used programs like audacity to review ecoacoustic recordings although it is now possible to use AI to identify calls (birds in my case) using features in R. However, I think learning to identify calls by ear is a much more useful skill than being able to code for call recognition (one helps you in the lab the other in the field where most field ecologists spend their time).
The other main piece of software I use in the field is Memento relational database (android) which allows for in-field electronic data input.
All the best.
I used TPSDIG to describe a tadpole. But it's a nice free software for morphometrics and can be used for other taxa.
https://life.bio.sunysb.edu/morph/index.html
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