This is the fourth interview with the scientists who won our call. It's time to meet Milka Elshishka from the Institute of Biodiversity and Ecosystem Research, Bulgarian Academy of Sciences, Bulgaria. The project is named "Cyber catalogue and revision of the nematode genus Enchodelus (Nordiidae, Dorylaimida)".

How did you find out about BiCIKL and this call?

I learned about the BiCIKL project from the BiCIKL user requirements questionnaire that was sent by email to scientists from our institute (Institute of Biodiversity and Ecosystem Research, Bulgarian Academy of Sciences).

Why did you apply here? To address what challenge/need?

We decided to apply because the taxa we work with have multiple gaps in knowledge that do not allow clarification of taxonomic relationships. We believe that the services provided by BiCIKL Call for Expression of Interest for biodiversity data-related scientific proposals will help to resolve these problems.

How would BiCIKL help in addressing this challenge?

Through its services, BiCIKL project provides assistance with access to data, assistance with access to collections and specimen data; data management and archiving or support with the use of complex bioinformatics tools (sequence assembly, clustering and annotation); аutomatic text and data mining and annotation pipelines for full-text articles with semantic search engines; access to liberated data from publications in formats that allow further annotation or text and data mining.

Who will benefit from your project?
The aim of our project is to create a cyber catalogue of the genus Enchodelus by bringing together all available information on the species, which will be published in the Biodiversity Data Journal and will serve as an exemplar model work for this kind of data assemblage on a taxon in nematology and possibility in other disciplines. The results will be linked to records in GBIF, CoL, Treatment Bank, Biodiversity Literature Repository, ENA, iBOL. Thanks to it, the data which until now are not available in a digitized version will be made accessible for the scientific community. This catalogue will be of use for various experts e.g., taxonomists, ecologists, environmental specialists etc.

What would you consider a success for your project?
Success for us will be the realization of the project's goal and the fulfilment of all the tasks. The obtained results should contribute to filling the gaps in the knowledge of the studied taxon and support the future work of biodiversity scientists.

How would you sum up your project, in a few sentences?

Cyber catalogue of the nematode genus Enchodelus - a full picture of all known information on the species of genus will be provided at one place.