Information Elements
MIDS Information Elements
DRAFT
MIDS List of Information Elements
Title : MIDS List of Information Elements
Date version issued : yyyy-mm-dd
Date created : yyyy-mm-dd
Part of TDWG Standard : DRAFT
This version : DRAFT
Latest version : DRAFT
Contributors : Elspeth Haston (https://orcid.org/0000-0001-9144-2848) (Royal Botanic Garden Edinburgh, UK), Cat Chapman (https://orcid.org/0000-0002-0681-2515) (Northern Arizona University & iDigBio, USA), Alex Hardisty (Cardiff University), Wouter Addink (Naturalis, NL), Mathias Dillen (https://orcid.org/0000-0002-3973-1252) (Meise Botanic Garden, BE), (Quentin Groom (Meise Botanic Garden, BE), (Falko Glöckler (Museum für Naturkunde Berlin, DE), Deborah Paul (iDigBio, USA), Mareike Petersen (Museum für Naturkunde Berlin, DE), Hannu Saarenmaa (Bioshare Digitization, FI), (Anton Güntsch - Botanic Garden and Botanical Museum Berlin, DE), Ben Norton, Anke Penzlin (https://orcid.org/0000-0003-2183-893X) (Senckenberg – Leibniz Institution for Biodiversity and Earth System Research) , Claus Weiland (https://orcid.org/0000-0003-0351-6523) (Senckenberg – Leibniz Institution for Biodiversity and Earth System Research), Eirik Rindal (https://orcid.org/0000-0003-1568-6386) (Natural History Museum, University of Oslo), Dagmar Triebel (https://orcid.org/0000-0003-1980-3148) (Bavarian Natural History Collections), Rachel Walcott (https://orcid.org/0000-0002-0488-6393) (National Museums Scotland), Donat Agosti (https://orcid.org/0000-0001-9286-1200) (Plazi), Felipe Simoes (https://orcid.org/0000-0002-1218-2839) (Plazi), Josh Humphries (https://orcid.org/0000-0001-5493-9804) Natural History Museum, London. Alex Hardisty created the foundation for this work.
Creator : TDWG MIDS Task Group
Bibliographic citation : MIDS Task Group. 2025. MIDS List of Information Elements. Biodiversity Information Standards (TDWG). DRAFT
1 Introduction
This document contains all information elements that are part of the most recent version of the Minimum Information about a Digital Specimen (MIDS) specification. It also lists all recognized MIDS levels and schemas that bundle sets of information elements important for distinct specimen disciplines.
1.1 Status of the content of this document
In the list of Information Elements, the Element Name, Element URI, Label, Level, Definition, isRequiredBy are normative. Labels and the values of all other properties (such as Mappings, Usage Note, Purpose and Examples) are non-normative (informative). Definitions of MIDS levels, disciplines and discipline schemas are normative.
1.2 RFC 2119 key words
The key words "MUST", "MUST NOT", "REQUIRED", "SHALL", "SHALL NOT", "SHOULD", "SHOULD NOT", "RECOMMENDED", "MAY", and "OPTIONAL" in this document are to be interpreted as described in RFC 2119.
1.3 Definitions
2 Borrowed Vocabulary
MIDS does not borrow terms from other standards, but instead uses mappings from MIDS information elements to those terms. When terms are mapped, MIDS uses the IRIs, common abbreviations, and namespace prefixes in use by those standards.
Table 1. Vocabularies from which terms have been borrowed (non-normative)
Note: URIs for terms in most of these namespaces do not dereference to anything. The authoritative documentation can be obtained by clicking on the vocabulary names in the table.
| Vocabulary | Abbreviation | Namespaces and abbreviations |
|---|---|---|
| Darwin Core | DwC | dwc: = http://rs.tdwg.org/dwc/terms/ |
| Dublin Core | DC | dc: = http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/, dcterms: = http://purl.org/dc/terms/ |
| Schema.org | Schema | schema: = https://schema.org/version/latest/schemaorg-current-https.rdf |
| Resource Description Framework | RDF | rdf: = http://www.w3.org/1999/02/22-rdf-syntax-ns# |
| Access to Biological Collection Data | ABCD | abcd: = https://abcd.tdwg.org/terms/ |
3 Namespaces, Prefixes and Term Names
The namespace of MIDS information elements may be (http://rs.tdwg.org/mids/elements/xxxx) but this is yet to be confirmed. In the table of information elements, each entry has an information element name in Pascal Case to be used with this namespace. It is RECOMMENDED that implementers who need a namespace prefix for the MIDS namespace use mids. In this web document, hovering over a term in the Index By Information Element Name list below will reveal a complete URL that can be used in other web documents to link to this document’s treatment of that element.
Please note that the names of the information elements are still in draft and have not yet been ratified. They may therefore be subject to change.
4 MIDS Levels
The MIDS framework provides a structured approach to assess the digitisation status of specimens, with four progressive levels, each building on the previous one. It was developed with input from the community and reflects real-world digitisation practices, taking into account available resources and time.
MIDS Levels 0 and 1 are generic for all specimens or collection items. In MIDS Level 2 and 3 a distinction is made between biological, geological and palaeontological specimens for the information required.
| Level | Label | Description | Purpose |
|---|---|---|---|
| 0 | Bare | A bare or skeletal record making the association between an identifier of a physical specimen and its digital representation, allowing for unambiguous attachment of all other information. | Allows for unambiguous attachment of all other information and to allow a user to discover the location of the physical specimen to access additional information or to request access to the physical specimen. |
| 1 | Basic | A basic record of specimen information enabling basic discoverability as well as how the user is permitted to use the data. | Creates a digital representation of the physical collections. Provides information about the number of specimens present for a taxon as well as some information about the kind of object, enabling curators and other users to find the specimens within the collections. Also enables costing calculations for storage, digitisation and other curation activities. If imaged, also enables similar search and browsing capabilities online as researchers and curators would have at the cabinets of physical specimens. |
| 2 | Intermediate | An intermediary level of information including data that have been agreed over time as essential for most scientific purposes. | Key information fields that have been agreed over time as essential for most scientific purposes. |
| 3 | Extended | An extended level of information about a specimen including identifiers enabling connections to be made to other data present or known about the specimen. | Enables linked open data. |
5 Disciplines
The MIDS task group currently recognises three disciplines for specimen data to enable different digitisation priorities to be accepted for different collections: Biology, Geology, Paleontology. Each discipline has a schema for the information elements, defining at which level each element is required. Each discipline also has mapping schemas, requiring datasets to be allocated to a schema for calculation to be undertaken.
5.1 Discipline Terms
| Term | Definition | Source |
|---|---|---|
| Biology | Biology is the science of life. It is concerned with the characteristics and behaviors of organisms | Modern Science Ontology |
| Geology | Study of the planet earth, its composition, structure, physical and chemical processes, and history since its origin | USGS Thesaurus |
| Paleontology | Study of life in past geologic time based on fossil plants and animals | USGS Thesaurus |
5.2 Discipline Schemas
5.2.1 Biology
5.2.2 Paleontology
5.2.3 Geology
6 Information Elements
MIDS defines the information required at each level of digitisation and structures the information into individual elements. In order to measure the level of digitisation of collections where information may be captured in many different database fields and mapped to many different TDWG Standards terms, a construct is needed which groups related fields into a structured framework so that the presence of data can be calculated. This construct is the MIDS Information Element.
6.1 Information Elements Schema
| Element Name Chronostratigraphy | |
|---|---|
| Element URI | (Pending) |
| Label | Chronostratigraphy |
| Definition | Refers to the relative age of a specimen defined by bodies of rocks, layered or unlayered, that are defined between specified stratigraphic horizons which represent specified intervals of geologic time. |
| Usage Note | Where applicable or possible, adheres to the units in the International Chronostratigraphic Chart (https://stratigraphy.org/chart/) |
| Purpose | Designate specimens with a geologic age defined relative to other organisms, rocks, or features or events rather than in terms of years. |
| isRequiredBy |
|
| Mapppings | Darwin Core Mappings ABCD Mappings |
| Element Name CollectingAgent | |
|---|---|
| Element URI | (Pending) |
| Label | Collecting Agent |
| Definition | A list (concatenated and separated) of names of people, groups, or organizations responsible for recording the original Occurrence. |
| Usage Note | It is recommended to include a verbatim version of the name as it appears on the label. The primary collector or observer, especially one who applies a collecting identifier (recordNumber), should be listed first. It is also strongly recommended to also include people identifiers such as ORCID, Wikidata (See mids:CollectorID). |
| Purpose | For many biological collections the collector in combination with collectingNumber has been used as an identifier for the specimen in literature. It also helps in the identification and validation of the collecting location. |
| isRequiredBy |
|
| Examples |
|
| Mapppings | Darwin Core Mappings ABCD Mappings |
| Element Name CollectingAgentID | |
|---|---|
| Element URI | (Pending) |
| Label | Collecting Agent ID |
| Definition | A list (concatenated and separated) of the identifier(s) for the person, people, groups, or expeditions responsible for collecting the specimen. |
| Usage Note | It is strongly recommended to use resolvable ORCiD identifiers for people, or Wikidata identifiers for people or expeditions. It is also recommended to list the primary collectorID, especially one who applies a field/collecting number, first. |
| Purpose | To uniquely identify the collector of a specimen in a machine readable format. |
| isRequiredBy |
|
| Examples |
|
| Mapppings | Darwin Core Mappings ABCD Mappings |
| Element Name CollectingNumber | |
|---|---|
| Element URI | (Pending) |
| Label | Collecting Number |
| Definition | An identifier given to the specimen at the time it was recorded. Often serves as a link between field notes and a specimen record. |
| Usage Note | It is recommended to use s.n. (sine numero - without number) or equivalent if not present. |
| Purpose | For many biological collections the collector in combination with collectingNumber has been used as an identifier for the specimen in literature. It also helps in the identification and validation of the collecting location. |
| isRequiredBy |
|
| Examples |
|
| Mapppings | Darwin Core Mappings ABCD Mappings |
| Element Name DateCollected | |
|---|---|
| Element URI | (Pending) |
| Label | Date Collected |
| Definition | The date/time at which a gathering event occurred. For specimen gathering, this is the date/time when the event was recorded. |
| Usage Note | It is strongly recommended to use ISO 8601 standard with extended format for human readability. s.d. (sine diem - without date) or equivalent if not present or not known. |
| Purpose | To provide accurate information about when the specimen was collected. |
| isRequiredBy |
|
| Examples |
|
| Mapppings | Darwin Core Mappings ABCD Mappings |
| Element Name GeographicalLocalityID | |
|---|---|
| Element URI | (Pending) |
| Label | Geographical Locality ID |
| Definition | An identifier for the geographical locality where the specimen was collected. |
| Purpose | To provide an identifier for the geographical locality which ensures that there is no ambiguity, particular for geographical locality names which are not unique. Also has the potential to create a link between the geographical locality name and a shape file. |
| isRequiredBy |
|
| Examples |
|
| Mapppings | Darwin Core Mappings ABCD Mappings |
| Element Name IdentifiedByID | |
|---|---|
| Element URI | (Pending) |
| Label | Identified By ID |
| Definition | A list (concatenated and separated) of the identifier(s) for the person, people, groups, or organizations responsible for assigning the scientific name to the subject. |
| Usage Note | It is strongly recommended to use resolvable ORCiD identifiers for people, or Wikidata identifiers for people or expeditions. |
| Purpose | To provide provenance for the identification of the specimen. |
| isRequiredBy |
|
| Examples |
|
| Mapppings | Darwin Core Mappings ABCD Mappings |
| Element Name IndentifiedAsID | |
|---|---|
| Element URI | (Pending) |
| Label | Indentifier As ID |
| Definition | An identifier for the nomenclatural (not taxonomic) details of a scientific name. |
| Usage Note | It is strongly recommended to use identifiers from the recognised nomenclators for the appropriate taxonomic group (e.g. the International Plant Names Index (IPNI), MycoBank, AlgaeBase, Mindat, etc). |
| Purpose | To uniquly identify the taxon name of a specimen in a machine readable format. |
| isRequiredBy |
|
| Mapppings | Darwin Core Mappings ABCD Mappings |
| Element Name License | |
|---|---|
| Element URI | (Pending) |
| Label | License |
| Definition | License under which the specimen data are published. |
| Usage Note | Use Creative Commons license framework. Use as unrestricted license as possible. |
| Purpose | To enable all users to determine how they can use the specimen data. |
| isRequiredBy |
|
| Examples |
|
| Mapppings | Darwin Core Mappings ABCD Mappings |
| Element Name Mass | |
|---|---|
| Element URI | (Pending) |
| Label | Mass |
| Definition | The quantity of matter in a specimen, particularly for minerals, phases and meteorites |
| isRequiredBy |
|
| Mapppings | Darwin Core Mappings ABCD Mappings |
| Element Name Media | |
|---|---|
| Element URI | (Pending) |
| Label | Media |
| Definition | A list (concatenated and separated) of media associated with the specimen. |
| Usage Note | It is strongly recommended to follow Audiovisual Core standards; identifier for IIIF manifest and/or image |
| Purpose | To allow a user to locate mediafiles of the specimen. |
| isRequiredBy |
|
| Examples |
|
| Mapppings | Darwin Core Mappings ABCD Mappings |
| Element Name MediaID | |
|---|---|
| Element URI | (Pending) |
| Label | Media ID |
| Definition | A list (concatenated and separated) of identifiers of media associated with the Specimen. |
| Usage Note | It is strongly recommended to follow Audiovisual Core standards; identifier(s) for IIIF manifest and/or image. |
| Purpose | To allow a user (human or machine) to locate mediafiles of the specimen. |
| isRequiredBy |
|
| Mapppings | Darwin Core Mappings ABCD Mappings |
| Element Name Modified | |
|---|---|
| Element URI | (Pending) |
| Label | Modified |
| Definition | UTC date/time of date/time of first creation or subsequent modification, if any. |
| Usage Note | Use ISO 8601. UTC date/time, extended format (for human readability). |
| Purpose | To enable users (humans/machines) to determine if there have been any changes to the record since it was last viewed. |
| isRequiredBy |
|
| Examples |
|
| Mapppings | Darwin Core Mappings ABCD Mappings |
| Element Name Name | |
|---|---|
| Element URI | (Pending) |
| Label | Name |
| Definition | A name given to the object. Any string of characters and/or numbers by which the object is referenced within a collection. For example, the name the specimen is stored under, its scientific or taxonomic name if known, how it is labelled, etc. This name is not necessarily its name according to an accepted scientific classification, identification, or taxonomic determination (i.e., scientific name) but it often can be the same as that. |
| Usage Note | It is recommended to follow standard nomenclators, e.g. the International Plant Names Index (IPNI), MycoBank, AlgaeBase, Mindat, etc |
| Purpose | Information to aid the discoverability of specimens by users and the ability to retrieve them within a collection. |
| isRequiredBy |
|
| Examples |
|
| Mapppings | Darwin Core Mappings ABCD Mappings |
| Element Name ObjectType | |
|---|---|
| Element URI | (Pending) |
| Label | Object Type |
| Definition | General term to describe the kind of specimen. |
| Usage Note | It is recommended to use the ontology being developed for the DwC term Preparations. |
| Purpose | To enable curators to determine equipment/method/cost of imaging the specimen, to enable researchers to determine equipment/method required for viewing/analysing the specimen, to enable curators/researchers to know in which collection/location within the institution the specimen is held. |
| isRequiredBy |
|
| Examples |
|
| Mapppings | Darwin Core Mappings ABCD Mappings |
| Element Name Organization | |
|---|---|
| Element URI | (Pending) |
| Label | Organization |
| Definition | A term to indicate in which institution the specimen is held. This may include an institution code and an institution identifier. |
| Usage Note | It is strongly recommended to include a human readable term and a globally unique persistent and resolvable identifier from GrSciColl, GRID, ROR, etc. |
| Purpose | To allow a user to discover the location of the physical specimen to access additional information or to request access to the physical specimen. |
| isRequiredBy |
|
| Examples |
|
| Mapppings | Darwin Core Mappings ABCD Mappings |
| Element Name OrganizationID | |
|---|---|
| Element URI | (Pending) |
| Label | Organization ID |
| Definition | An identifier for the institution having custody of the object(s). |
| Usage Note | It is strongly recommended to use a globally unique persistent and resolvable identifier such as GrSciColl, ROR. |
| Purpose | To allow a user (human or machine) to locate the physical location of the specimen. |
| isRequiredBy |
|
| Examples |
|
| Mapppings | Darwin Core Mappings ABCD Mappings |
| Element Name PhysicalSpecimenID | |
|---|---|
| Element URI | (Pending) |
| Label | Physical Specimen ID |
| Definition | A unique identity for the specimen within the curating institution. Whatever the institution uses to uniquely identify the item. For example: DOI, stable identifier, catalogue number, barcode, etc. |
| Usage Note | It is strongly recommended to use a globally unique persistent identifier, preferably resolvable, e.g. CETAF Stable Identifiers or DOIs. It is strongly recommended to map these to the DwC term materialSampleID. |
| Purpose | To allow the curator/researcher to identify the physical specimen to which the data refer. To allow citation of the specimen. To enable the attachment of additional information to the specimen record. |
| isRequiredBy |
|
| Examples |
|
| Mapppings | Darwin Core Mappings ABCD Mappings |
| Element Name QualitativeLocation | |
|---|---|
| Element URI | (Pending) |
| Label | Qualitative Location |
| Definition | A term to describe the where the specimen was collected. In combination with quantitativeLocation; should capture textual geographic information. |
| Usage Note | The most precise locality should be captured, given information available with the specimen. It is recommended to include additional higher level geography, mapped to the appropriate terms, to reduce ambiguity of place names. |
| Purpose | A human readable location. Can also be used to help identify the quantitativeLocation. |
| isRequiredBy |
|
| Examples |
|
| Mapppings | Darwin Core Mappings ABCD Mappings |
| Element Name QuantitativeLocation | |
|---|---|
| Element URI | (Pending) |
| Label | Quantitative Location |
| Definition | A term to describe where the specimen was collected. A quantitative measure that would include coordinate or shape data, an identifier, or data that can be easily converted into a quantitative measure. In combination with the qualitative term, qualitativeLocality. |
| Usage Note | It is strongly recommended to follow the best practice in the Georeferencing Quick Reference Guide (Zermoglio PF, Chapman AD, Wieczorek JR, Luna MC & Bloom DA, 2020 https://doi.org/10.35035/e09p-h128). It is recommended to use an identifier for the most precise spatial region or named place, given information available with the specimen. If an identifier is not being used then the data should correspond to a recognised geographic standard (eg, OGC webservices, WFS, ISO 3166, Geonames, GADM) |
| Purpose | To enable a person or machine to identify and/or map the geographical location in which the collection was made. |
| isRequiredBy |
|
| Examples |
|
| Mapppings | Darwin Core Mappings ABCD Mappings |
| Element Name StratigraphicContext | |
|---|---|
| Element URI | (Pending) |
| Label | StratigraphicContext |
| Definition | Refers to the stratigraphic information associated with an earth sciences specimen including biostratigraphic, lithostratigraphic, and tectonostratigraphic units |
| Usage Note | Where applicable or possible, adherence to the conventions in the International Stratigraphic Guide and the usage of authoritative stratigraphic lexicons as sources of geologic unit names are highly recommended |
| Purpose | Designate specimen enriched with information associated with their source material for which they share a composition linneage specific to geological collections |
| isRequiredBy |
|
| Mapppings | Darwin Core Mappings ABCD Mappings |