News & Events

For the first time, SYNTHESYS will be offering virtual access to collections through digitisation. The Virtual Access (VA) programme is not a direct digital parallel of Transnational (physical) Access (TA) - proposals for digitisation will be prioritised and carried out based on community demand, and data must be made openly available. A key feature of Virtual Access is that, unlike TA, it does...

1 February sees the first Access call of SYNTHESYS+ go live. Submissions will be open until 12 April 2019, 17.00 UK time. 

SYNTHESYS+ project funding enables scientists (Users) based in European Member and Associated States to undertake short visits to utilise a 'Taxonomic Access Facility' (TAF).  Collections, staff expertise and analyt...

The SYNTHESYS+ consortium will accept applications for Access between 1 February - 12 April, 17.00 UK time. 

The Access stream of the project facilitates and allocates funds for visits to collections and research infrastructures (including lab facilities) in a country where the user does not work. Funds allow external scientists to be hosted for a short time at consortium institutio...

Following the UK referendum vote on membership of the European Union, the Natural History Museum reaffirms its commitment to continue to work in European and global partnerships.

The implications of the result of the referendum are not yet clear and UK government decisions on exit from the EU have yet to be made. Indications are that the process of exit will not be initiated until Octobe...

In just 3 days the 31st annual meeting of the Society for the Preservation of Natural History Collections will begin in Berlin. The conference will feature the following symposia organised by SYNTHESYS3: Enabling Infrastructure:  Future Collections, Data & Informatics Key Topics: Data mobilisation – infrastructures aiding the digitisation of collections at scale Data aggregators &<...

OPTIMA – the Organisation for the Phyto-Taxonomic Investigation of the Mediterranean Area – held their triennial general meeting in Montpelier, France from the 6th to the 11th June 2016.

This was attended by Ernst Vitek of NHMW who gave a presentation relating to the upcoming SYNTHESYS Access call.

For information about the meeting see 

A meeting will be held in Crete on the 25th May to discuss the creation of a handbook of best practice and standards for 3D imaging of Natural History specimens (NA2 Task 1.2; JRA Task 2.1).  JRA Task 2.2 – the development of protocols and workflows for the rapid digitisation of collections through Micro-CT – 

The first European Citizen Science Association (ECSA) conference will be taking place from the 19th – 21st May in Berlin. The event will involve three days of talks, interactive sessions and panels to discuss and network with Citizen Science enthusiasts, practitioners, academic researchers, policy makers, science funders, non-governmental organisations, interested citizens and other stakeholder...

A meeting of the Environmental Research Infrastructure (ENVRI) Community will take place in Zandvoort, the Netherlands on Tuesday 10th May 2016. ENVIplus is a Horizon 2020 project bringing together Environmental and Earth System Research Infrastructures, projects and networks together with technical specialist partners to create a more coherent, interdisciplinary and interoperable cluster of En...

Location:  Slovak Academy of Sciences, Bratislava

The purpose of this workshop is to bring together members of the CETAF Digitisation Group and the CETAF Information Science and Technology Commission in order to align activities and to identify new fields of cooperation.

For more information, please see