Next-generation specimen digitization: capturing reflectance spectra from the world's herbaria for modeling plant biology across time, space, and taxa

Spectral reflectance measured from herbarium specimens represents a potentially vast source of information relevant to plant taxon identification and functional traits, which has inspired many laboratories world-wide to initiate next-generation spectral digitization from specimens. Combining these datasets into a coordinated global database would generate new capacity to model plant traits globally, enabling connection with remote sensing and ecological and biosphere models, as well as reconstruction of trait evolution. However, coordination is needed to avoid downstream problems in data aggregation due to variation in data standards and technical specifications of the instruments, optical setups, or measurement protocols. The International Herbarium Spectral Digitization (IHerbSpec) working group has initiated a globally collaborative program, outlining the central issues to address in establishing protocols, standards, and best practices, and proposing next steps. This collaborative effort will allow generation of replicable spectral reflectance data from plant specimens housed in herbaria around the world within ongoing digitization programs following community-defined standards and Findable, Accessible, Interoperable, and Reusable (FAIR) principles.