The SMarTaR-ID concept was born from a workshop funded by the Deep-Sea Biology Society that took place in December 2017. That workshop led to the development of a paper (Howell et al., 2019) that outlined the need for a standardised marine taxon reference image database, and provided a draft database structure. It also began work on the development of a unified species catalogue for the North Atlantic. Image reference libraries were submitted by researchers, using the draft database structure, to a central pool. The libraries were then merged, rationalised, and quality checked by taxonomists, before being added to SMarTaR-ID. This web interface for SMarTaR-ID was created with funding from the UK’s Global Challenges Research Fund as part of the One Ocean Hub.

The current library is for the North Atlantic, and is constructed from merging images from the following contributors:

Kerry Howell, Jaime Davies (Plymouth University), Louise Allcock, Claire Laguionie Marchais (NUIG), Rui Vieira, Tabitha Pearman (NOC), Tom Hourigan, Enrique Salgado (NOAA), Rebecca Ross (MAREANO), Michael Thompson (Gardline), Paris Stefanoudis (Nekton), Lenaick Menot (Ifremer), Marina Carreiro-Silva, Carlos Dominguez Carrió (IMAR).

With the support of the following taxonomists:

Chris Mah (Asteroidea, Echinoidea), Tim O’Hara (Ophiuroidea), Charles Messing, Marc Eléaume (Crinoidea), Meg Daly, Sergio Stampar, Estefania Rodriguez (Anemones), Joana Xavier, Christine Morrow, Pilar Ríos, Paco Cardenas, Francisca Carvalho, Javier Cristobo, Maria Cristina Diaz (Sponges), Dennis Opresko, Andreia Braga-Henriques, Louise Allcock (Corals). Rosanna Milligan, Tracey Sutton (Fish).

If you use SMarTaR-ID, please use the following citations:

SMarTaR-ID V1 Consortium (2022) SMarTaR-ID. Accessed https://smartar-id.app/ on DATE.

Howell, K.L., Davies, J.S., Allcock, A.L., Braga-Henriques, A., Buhl-Mortensen, P., Carreiro-Silva, M., Dominguez-Carrió, C., Durden, J.M., Foster, N.L., Game, C.A., Hitchin, B., Horton, T., Hosking, B., Jones, D.O.B., Mah, C., Laguionie Marchais, C., Menot, L., Morato, T., Pearman, T.R.R., Piechaud, N., Ross, R.E., Ruhl, H.A., Saeedi, H., Stefanoudis, P.V., Taranto, G.H., Thompson, M.B., Taylor, J.R., Tyler, P., Vad, J., Victorero, L., Vieira, R.P., Woodall, L.C., Xavier, J.R., Wagner, D., 2020. A framework for the development of a global standardised marine taxon reference image database (SMarTaR-ID) to support image-based analyses. PLOS ONE 14, e0218904. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0218904.