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The "Mansfeld Database" in its national and international context
The “Mansfeld Database” in its national and international context
H. KNÜPFFER 1 , J. OCHSMANN 2 and N. BIERMANN 1
The “Mansfeld Database” (Mansfeld’s World Database of Agricultural and Horticultural
Crops) is an online database that reflects the contents of “Mansfeld’s Encyclopedia
of Agricultural and Horticultural Crops” (HANELT and INSTITUTE OF PLANT
GENETICS AND CROP PLANT RESEARCH 2001). For further details, see OCHSMANN et al.
(2003), KNÜPFFER et al. (2002), or http://mansfeld.ipk-gatersleben.de/mansfeld/.
The institutional context
To avoid redundancies in the data the “Mansfeld Database” consists of several modules
containing different data types, such as taxonomic data and names, full text information,
plant uses, images, or references. This structure enables easy adding or
linking of further data types, such as evaluation or geographical data.
The “Mansfeld Database” with its more general information on a worldwide scale
complements other local databases such as the IPK Genebank Accessions Database
or the Database for Checklists of Cultivated Plants (KNÜPFFER and HAMMER
1999).
The national context
The “Mansfeld Database” is part of IPK’s contribution to the project “Federal Information
System on Genetic Resources” (BIG, http://www.big-flora.de/), which involves
four partner institutions, coordinated by the German Centre for Documentation and
Information in Agriculture (ZADI). The project is funded by the German Federal Ministry
of Education and Research (BMBF) for five years (1998-2003) and includes,
besides the “Mansfeld Database”, also information on plant genetic resources (PGR)
accessions of genebanks in Germany, botanical gardens, floristic mapping of the
1 Institute of Plant Genetics and Crop Plant Research (IPK)
Department of Genebank
Corrensstraße 3
D-06466 Gatersleben, Germany
2
Institute of Plant Genetics and Crop Plant Research (IPK)
Department of Taxonomy
Corrensstraße 3
D-06466 Gatersleben, Germany
present address: KWS Saat AG, Postfach 1463, D-37555 Einbeck, Germany
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