Plants of the World Online
{{Short description|Online taxonomic plant database}}
{{Use dmy dates|cs1-dates=ly|date=June 2020}}
{{Infobox website
| name = Plants of the World Online
| url = [https://powo.science.kew.org/ Plants of the World Online]
| areas =
| offices =
| commercial = No
| type =
| registration =
| language = English
| num_users =
| content_license =
| programming_language =
| owner = Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew
| author =
| editor =
| launch_date = {{Start date and age|2017|03}}
| ip =
| issn =
| eissn =
| oclc =
| current_status =
| footnotes =
}}
Plants of the World Online (POWO) is an online taxonomic database published by the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew.
History
Following the Convention on Biological Diversity, the Royal Botanic Gardens in Kew launched Plants of the World Online in March 2017 with the goal of creating an exhaustive online database of all seed-bearing plants worldwide.{{cite web |title=About the Plants of the World Online portal |url=https://powo.science.kew.org/about |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20180128165317/https://powo.science.kew.org/about |archive-date=2018-01-28 |access-date=2018-01-26 |work=Plants of the World Online |publisher=Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew}}{{cite journal |last=Govaerts |first=Rafaël H.A. |date=2018 |title=101 Nomenclatural Corrections in Preparation for the Plants of the World Online (POWO) |url=http://skvortsovia.uran.ru/2018/4301.pdf |journal=Skvortsovia |volume=4 |issue=3 |pages=74–99 |issn=2309-6497 |access-date=2024-09-01 |authorlink=Rafaël Govaerts}} (Govaerts wrongly speaks of "Convention for Botanical Diversity (CBD)). The initial focus was on tropical African flora, particularly flora Zambesiaca, flora of West and East Tropical Africa.
Since March 2024, the website has displayed AI-generated predictions of the extinction risk for each plant.{{Cite web |date=2024-03-05 |title=Scientists predict the extinction risk for all the world's plants with AI |url=https://phys.org/news/2024-03-scientists-extinction-world-ai.html |access-date=2024-12-09 |website=phys.org |language=en}}
Description
The database uses the same taxonomical source as the International Plant Names Index, which is the World Checklist of Vascular Plants (WCVP).{{Cite journal |title=Assessing extinction risk across the geographic ranges of plant species in Europe |journal=Plants, People, Planet |year= 2022|volume=4 |issue=3 |pages=303–311|doi= 10.1002/ppp3.10251|last1= Holz|first1= Hanna|last2= Segar|first2= Josiane|last3= Valdez|first3= Jose|last4= Staude|first4= Ingmar R.|s2cid= 246787127|doi-access= free}}
The database contains information on the world's flora gathered from 250 years of botanical research. It aims to make available data from projects that no longer have an online presence or were never externally available. POWO includes information on the taxonomy, identification, distribution, traits, threat status, and uses of plants worldwide, and it also contains many images.{{cite web | url = https://databaser.ub.gu.se/powo-plants-of-the-world-online/188846 | title = POWO Plants of the World Online | website = Gothenburg University Library | access-date = 2024-09-04 | archive-url = https://web.archive.org/web/20240904101710/https://databaser.ub.gu.se/powo-plants-of-the-world-online/188846 | archive-date = 2024-09-04 | url-status = live }}
{{As of|2024|September}}, POWO contained 1,433,000 global plant names, 531,800 detailed descriptions, and 400,900 images.
See also
References
External links
{{Wikidata property|P5037|position=left}}
- {{Official website|https://powo.science.kew.org/}}
{{Kew Gardens}}
Category:Online botany databases
Category:Online taxonomy databases
Category:Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew
Category:Databases in the United Kingdom
{{botany-stub}}