Our ELVIS poster presented by Joel Sachs and Cyndy Parr at the NBII All-Nodes Meeting was given an award for the poster generating the most interest. The poster describes a suite of tools being build as part of the NSF and USGS sponsored SPIRE project that is exploring how semantic web technologies can be used by ecological biologists.

The ELVIS (the Ecosystem Location Visualization and Information System) tool suite is motivated by the belief that food web structure plays a role in the success or failure of potential species invasions. Because very few ecosystems have been the subject of empirical foodweb studies, response teams are typically unable to get quick answers to questions like "what are likely prey and predator species of the invader in the new environment?" The focus of ELVIS is on providing evidence, as opposed to giving definitive answers to queries.

NBII is the National Biological Information Infrastructure -- a broad, collaborative program to provide increased access to data and information on the nation's biological resources. The All Nodes meeting was held 24 - 28 October, 2005 in Albuquerque NM.