![\"\"](\"https://chem-bla-ics.linkedchemistry.info/assets/images/Screenshot_20230402_084711.png\"/)
Das \"GEAS-Anpassungsgesetz\" erm\u00f6glicht es den Bundesl\u00e4ndern, besondere Zentren f\u00fcr diejenigen Schutzsuchenden einzurichten, f\u00fcr deren Asylverfahren m\u00f6glicherweise ein anderer EU-Mitgliedstaat zust\u00e4ndig ist. Bislang haben Sachsen, Sachsen-Anhalt und Hamburg erkl\u00e4rt, entsprechende Zentren einzurichten oder bereits eingerichtet. Der Beitrag zeigt die menschenrechtlichen Risiken auf, die mit den Regelungen zur Ausgestaltung der Zentren verbunden sind: Schutzsuchende k\u00f6nnen unverh\u00e4ltnism\u00e4\u00dfig in ihrer Freiheit beschr\u00e4nkt werden und laufen Gefahr, dass ihre elementaren Grundbed\u00fcrfnisse nicht erf\u00fcllt werden. \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0
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Die Reform des Gemeinsamen Europ\u00e4ischen Asylsystems (GEAS) wurde auf europ\u00e4ischer Ebene nach jahrelangen Verhandlungen im Mai 2024 beschlossen und ist am 12. Juni 2026 in Kraft getreten. Der Bundestag hat im Februar 2026 ein Gesetz (BT-Drs. 21/1848 und BT-Drs. 21/4321) verabschiedet, um die Reform in das deutsche Recht umzusetzen (Gesetz zur Anpassung des nationalen Rechts an die Reform des Gemeinsamen Europ\u00e4ischen Asylsystems, sog. GEAS-Anpassungsgesetz). Das Gesetz passierte den Bundesrat im M\u00e4rz 2026 ohne Einspruch und ist ebenfalls am 12. Juni 2026 in Kraft getreten. Ein wichtiger Teil des Gesetzes sind die sogenannten \"Aufnahmeeinrichtungen zur Durchf\u00fchrung von Verfahren der Sekund\u00e4rmigration\", oder \"Sekund\u00e4rmigrationszentren\". Dort sollen alle Asylsuchenden untergebracht werden, die zuerst in einen anderen EU-Mitgliedstaat eingereist sind und die sich daher dort aufzuhalten haben (zuvor besser bekannt als sogenannte \"Dublin\"-F\u00e4lle) oder die bereits einen Schutzstatus in einem anderen Mitgliedstaat haben und in Deutschland erneut einen Asylantrag stellen.
\nDie Bundesl\u00e4nder werden gem\u00e4\u00df \u00a7\u00a044 Absatz 1a AsylG erm\u00e4chtigt (aber nicht verpflichtet), solche Zentren einzurichten. Ziel ist es, die Zahl von Dublin-\u00dcberstellungen \"signifikant zu erh\u00f6hen\" (BT-Drs. 21/1848, S. 81). Tats\u00e4chlich ist die Zahl der Dublin-\u00dcberstellungen gering \u2013 jedoch liegt das h\u00e4ufig an mangelnder Kooperation der anderen EU-Mitgliedstaaten, oder Verz\u00f6gerungen bei den Beh\u00f6rden selbst.
\nVorl\u00e4ufer dieser Zentren gibt es bereits jetzt: In Hamburg und Eisenh\u00fcttenstadt wurden noch unter der Ampel-Regierung sogenannte \"Dublin-Zentren\" er\u00f6ffnet, um die Verfahren nach der Verordnung (EU) 604/2013 (sogenannte Dublin-III-Verordnung) und insbesondere R\u00fcck\u00fcberstellungen in den zust\u00e4ndigen Mitgliedstaat zu beschleunigen. Die in Eisenh\u00fcttenstadt untergebrachten Schutzsuchenden kritisierten in einer \u00f6ffentlichen Stellungnahme gravierende Zust\u00e4nde in der Einrichtung.
\nMit Blick auf die Vorgaben des GEAS-Anpassungsgesetzes ergeben sich aus grund-, menschen- und unionsrechtlicher Perspektive auch an den Sekund\u00e4rmigrationszentren Kritikpunkte (siehe auch bereits Fischer-Uebler hier, hier und Deutsches Institut f\u00fcr Menschenrechte hier). Die Kritik betrifft den erschwerten Zugang zu Unterst\u00fctzungsangeboten, die Qualit\u00e4t einzelner Ma\u00dfnahmen als Freiheitsentziehungen, die gesetzliche Vermutung der Fluchtgefahr, mangelnde Ausnahmevorschriften und die fehlerhafte \u00dcbertragung des Begriffs der \"\u00f6ffentlichen Ordnung\" ins nationale Recht.
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Allein die Verpflichtung, in einer bestimmten Einrichtung zu wohnen, ist \u2013 unabh\u00e4ngig von den dort m\u00f6glichen Freiheitsbeschr\u00e4nkungen (siehe dazu sogleich) \u2013 mit erheblichen Einschr\u00e4nkungen f\u00fcr Schutzsuchende verbunden.
\nDen Personen in den Einrichtungen ist es h\u00e4ufig nicht m\u00f6glich, Bekannte, Freund*innen oder Familienangeh\u00f6rige zu treffen, spezialisierte medizinische Versorgung in Anspruch zu nehmen oder rechtliche Unterst\u00fctzung zu finden. All das geht nur, wenn ihr famili\u00e4res Netzwerk oder die entsprechenden Unterst\u00fctzungsangebote von der Einrichtung aus tats\u00e4chlich erreichbar sind. Das ist insbesondere bei l\u00e4ndlich gelegenen Unterk\u00fcnften aber oftmals nicht der Fall.
\nF\u00fcr besonders vulnerable Schutzsuchende ist die Verpflichtung, in einer bestimmten Einrichtung zu wohnen, noch gravierender. Das gilt beispielsweise f\u00fcr Personen, die von Menschenhandel, von geschlechtsspezifischer oder von h\u00e4uslicher Gewalt betroffen sind. Sie k\u00f6nnen spezielle Schutz- oder Unterst\u00fctzungsangebote oft nicht in Anspruch nehmen \u2013 zum Beispiel, wenn sie Schutz in einer Schutzwohnung oder in einem Frauenhaus suchen m\u00f6chten.
\nF\u00fcr regul\u00e4re Aufnahmeeinrichtungen, die keine Sekund\u00e4rmigrationszentren sind, ist in \u00a7 44 Absatz 2 AsylG ausdr\u00fccklich geregelt, dass geeignete Ma\u00dfnahmen getroffen werden sollen, um die \"besonderen Bed\u00fcrfnisse bei der Aufnahme\" zu identifizieren und zu ber\u00fccksichtigen. Auch der Schutz von Frauen, Kindern und weiteren schutzbed\u00fcrftigen Personen muss gew\u00e4hrleistet werden. Das gilt nach einer m\u00f6glichen Lesart (siehe etwa Deutsches Institut f\u00fcr Menschenrechte) zumindest dem Wortlaut nach f\u00fcr die Sekund\u00e4rmigrationseinrichtungen nicht. Dabei ist Deutschland nach Artikel 24 der Richtlinie 2024/1346 (Aufnahmerichtlinie) auch dort verpflichtet, besondere Bed\u00fcrfnisse bei der Aufnahme zu ber\u00fccksichtigen. Zwar sind Sekund\u00e4rmigrationszentren in der GEAS-Reform weder verpflichtend geregelt noch \u00fcberhaupt vorgesehen \u2013 die Aufnahmerichtlinie differenziert diesbez\u00fcglich nicht. Sie gilt aber immer dann, wenn Mitgliedstaaten die Aufnahme von Asylsuchenden regeln. Hier besteht gesetzlicher Anpassungsbedarf.
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F\u00fcr Menschen in den Sekund\u00e4rmigrationseinrichtungen und in regul\u00e4ren Aufnahmeeinrichtungen kann bei Fluchtgefahr eine sogenannte Freiheitsbeschr\u00e4nkung angeordnet werden (\u00a7\u00a7 68 Absatz 1, 68a Absatz 1 AsylG). Das bedeutet, dass die Menschen die Einrichtung, in der sie untergebracht sind, dann nicht mehr verlassen d\u00fcrfen. F\u00fcr Menschen im laufenden Verfahren zur Bestimmung des zust\u00e4ndigen Mitgliedstaats bzw. im laufenden Asylverfahren darf die Beschr\u00e4nkung nur nachts (von 22 bis 6 Uhr) angeordnet werden (\u00a7\u00a7 68 Absatz 4 Satz 1, 68a Absatz 4 Satz 5 AsylG); f\u00fcr vollziehbar Ausreisepflichtige auch tags\u00fcber (\u00a7\u00a7\u00a068a Absatz 4 Satz 2, 68a Absatz 4 Satz 5 AsylG).
\nJedenfalls wenn diese Anordnung auch tags\u00fcber gilt, dann handelt es sich um eine Freiheitsentziehung im Sinne von Artikel 2 Absatz 2 Satz 2, 104 GG. Hier l\u00e4sst sich die Rechtsprechung des Bundesverfassungsgerichts zu den Ausgangsbeschr\u00e4nkungen w\u00e4hrend der Covid19-Pandemie heranziehen. Das Gericht hat in der Entscheidung drei Kriterien f\u00fcr die Einordnung einer Ausgangsbeschr\u00e4nkung als Freiheitsentziehung benannt. Erstens: Die Anordnung gilt tags\u00fcber und nicht nur zur Nachtzeit; zweitens: es ist ein fester Ort des Aufenthalts vorgegeben; drittens: es gibt keine oder nur wenige Ausnahmebestimmungen (Rn. 250). Alle diese Kriterien sind hier erf\u00fcllt.
\nKonsequenterweise m\u00fcssen der betroffenen Person dann alle Verfahrensrechte zustehen, die mit einer Inhaftierung einhergehen. Insbesondere darf die Anordnung gem\u00e4\u00df Artikel 104 Absatz 2 GG nur von einer Richterin oder einem Richter getroffen werden \u2013 das hat das Bundesverfassungsgericht im Jahr 2025 noch einmal betont. Ein solcher Richter*innenvorbehalt ist im Gesetz allerdings nicht vorgesehen.
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Sowohl in regul\u00e4ren Aufnahmeeinrichtungen als auch in Sekund\u00e4rmigrationseinrichtungen ist eine wichtige Voraussetzung f\u00fcr die Anordnung einer Freiheitsbeschr\u00e4nkung, dass Fluchtgefahr besteht (\u00a7\u00a7 68 Absatz 1, 68a Absatz 1 AsylG). Der Unterschied zu regul\u00e4ren Aufnahmeeinrichtungen ist aber: bei Menschen in Sekund\u00e4rmigrationseinrichtungen wird diese Fluchtgefahr vermutet und muss dann von den Betroffenen im Einzelfall widerlegt werden (\u00a7 68 Absatz 2 Satz 1 AsylG). Die Anordnung einer Freiheitsbeschr\u00e4nkung wird dadurch erheblich erleichtert.
\nBei der Freiheitsbeschr\u00e4nkung handelt es sich um einen empfindlichen Eingriff in die Grundrechte der betroffenen Personen. Das gilt unabh\u00e4ngig davon, ob oder in welchen Fallkonstellationen es sich um eine Freiheitsbeschr\u00e4nkung oder gar eine Freiheitsentziehung handelt. In jedem Fall m\u00fcssen sowohl die gesetzliche Erm\u00e4chtigung als auch die Anordnung im Einzelfall einer strengen Verh\u00e4ltnism\u00e4\u00dfigkeitspr\u00fcfung gen\u00fcgen.
\nDem wird die widerlegliche Vermutung der Fluchtgefahr nicht gerecht. Die gesetzliche Vermutung greift, ohne dass tats\u00e4chlich Anhaltspunkte im Einzelfall bestehen m\u00fcssen, dass sich die Person dem Verfahren entziehen will. Allein aufgrund der Tatsache, dass sich die Person im Verfahren zur Bestimmung des zust\u00e4ndigen Mitgliedstaats befindet, besteht die Gefahr der Freiheitsbeschr\u00e4nkung, ohne dass die Person etwas dagegen tun kann.
\nAu\u00dferdem ist die H\u00fcrde, die Fluchtgefahr zu widerlegen, unverh\u00e4ltnism\u00e4\u00dfig hoch. Denn die betroffenen Personen m\u00fcssen nachweisen, dass aufgrund ihrer pers\u00f6nlichen Verh\u00e4ltnisse und sozialen Bindungen in der Bundesrepublik ausgeschlossen ist, dass sie sich dem Verfahren entziehen werden (\u00a7 68 Absatz 2 Satz 2 AsylG). Personen, die verpflichtet sind, in Sekund\u00e4rmigrationseinrichtungen zu wohnen, wird es sehr schwerfallen, soziale Bindungen in Deutschland aufzubauen. Das gilt umso mehr, wenn sie die Einrichtung nicht verlassen d\u00fcrfen. Au\u00dferdem wird es kaum jemandem jemals gelingen, nachzuweisen, dass eine Flucht vollst\u00e4ndig ausgeschlossen ist \u2013 selbst wenn die Personen keinerlei Absichten dazu hat.
\nDar\u00fcber hinaus ist die Vermutung der Fluchtgefahr nicht von der Aufnahmerichtlinie gedeckt.
\nDie Fluchtgefahr ist nach der Aufnahmerichtlinie ein wichtiges Kriterium daf\u00fcr, die Freiheitsbeschr\u00e4nkung anordnen zu k\u00f6nnen. Dieses Kriterium wird ausgeh\u00f6hlt, wenn die Fluchtgefahr durch gesetzliche Anordnung allen Menschen in Sekund\u00e4rmigrationszentren unterstellt wird. Fluchtgefahr wird au\u00dferdem definiert als \"im Einzelfall vorliegende besondere Gr\u00fcnde und Umst\u00e4nde, die die auf objektiven, im nationalen Recht festgelegten Kriterien beruhen und zu der Annahme Anlass geben, dass ein Antragsteller fliehen k\u00f6nnte\" (Artikel 2 Nr. 11 Aufnahmerichtlinie, zu diesem Argument ausf\u00fchrlich bereits Eckert). Richtig ist zwar, dass die Aufnahmerichtlinie Menschen im Verfahren zur Bestimmung des zust\u00e4ndigen Mitgliedstaats als potentielle Fallgruppe f\u00fcr die Freiheitsbeschr\u00e4nkung in den Blick nimmt. Das entbindet aber nicht davon, Fluchtgefahr im Einzelfall zu begr\u00fcnden.
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Die Regelungen zu den Freiheitsbeschr\u00e4nkungen im aktuellen Gesetzentwurf sehen keine ausreichenden Ausnahmevorschriften vor. Gesetzliche Ausnahmen von der Freiheitsbeschr\u00e4nkung gelten nur f\u00fcr Termine bei Beh\u00f6rden und Gerichten und f\u00fcr den Regelschulbesuch Minderj\u00e4hriger (\u00a7\u00a7 68 Absatz 5 Satz 6, 68 Absatz 2 Satz 5 AsylG). Diese Ausnahmen sind aus menschenrechtlicher Perspektive zu eng. So sind beispielsweise Besuche bei \u00c4rzt*innen oder Anw\u00e4lt*innen oder anderen Beratungsstellen nicht schon von der gesetzlichen Ausnahme erfasst. F\u00fcr die Behandlung akuter Erkrankungen \"soll\" die zust\u00e4ndige Beh\u00f6rde eine Einzelfallerlaubnis zum Verlassen der Einrichtung erteilen (\u00a7\u00a068 Absatz 5 Satz 4 AsylG). Die Behandlung chronischer Leiden ist hiervon indes nicht erfasst. Das ist mit Blick auf das Recht auf Gesundheit problematisch (z.B. verankert in Artikel 12 UN-Sozialpakt); der Besuch bei Anw\u00e4lt*innen ist f\u00fcr den Zugang zu Rechtsschutz (siehe Rudolf, Menschenrecht auf Zugang zum Recht) unerl\u00e4sslich.
\nAu\u00dferdem sind Mitgliedstaaten nach der Aufnahmerichtlinie dazu verpflichtet, besondere Bed\u00fcrfnisse bei der Aufnahme zu ber\u00fccksichtigen (Artikel 24 Aufnahmerichtlinie). Wenn Menschen solche besonderen Bed\u00fcrfnisse bei der Aufnahme haben, weil sie etwa eine schwere (chronische) Erkrankung oder Behinderungen haben oder Opfer schwerster Gewalt geworden sind, k\u00f6nnen sie unter Umst\u00e4nden ihre Einrichtung nicht verlassen, um zum Arzt zu gehen, psychologische Betreuung zu erhalten oder spezielle Unterst\u00fctzungs- oder Beratungsangebote wahrzunehmen.
\nM\u00f6glicherweise k\u00f6nnen sie f\u00fcr diese Zwecke nicht einmal eine Erlaubnis im Einzelfall erhalten. Denn eine Verlassenserlaubnis im Einzelfall darf \u2013 mit Ausnahme zur Behandlung akuter Erkrankungen oder auch f\u00fcr berufliche Zwecke \u2013 f\u00fcr vollziehbar ausreisepflichtige Personen in Sekund\u00e4rmigrationseinrichtungen nur zur Wahrnehmung einer \"zwingend gebotenen sittlichen Verpflichtung\" erteilt werden (\u00a7 68 Absatz 5 Satz 5 AsylG).
\nDie Gesetzesbegr\u00fcndung liefert keine Anhaltspunkte daf\u00fcr, welche Umst\u00e4nde eine solche \"zwingend gebotene sittliche Verpflichtung\" begr\u00fcnden. Hier besteht aus menschenrechtlicher Perspektive die Gefahr einer restriktiven Auslegung. Gerade durch die Begrenzung auf \"sittliche Verpflichtungen\" kommen andere, unter Umst\u00e4nden zwingend oder auch nur dringend gebotenen Bed\u00fcrfnisse zu kurz. So k\u00f6nnten der Gang zur Apotheke oder Termine mit Anw\u00e4lt*innen gegebenenfalls als nicht zwingend geboten eingestuft werden, sodass die betroffenen Personen keine M\u00f6glichkeit h\u00e4tten, entsprechende Versorgung in Anspruch zu nehmen.
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Die Freiheitsbeschr\u00e4nkung kann nach dem GEAS-Anpassungsgesetz aus Gr\u00fcnden der \"\u00f6ffentlichen Ordnung\" angeordnet werden. Das Gesetz geht hier ausdr\u00fccklich vom nationalen Begriff der \u00f6ffentlichen Ordnung aus (BT-Drs. 21/1848, S. 116). Dadurch verst\u00f6\u00dft das Gesetz gegen das Unionsrecht. Zwar spricht auch die Aufnahmerichtlinie von der \"\u00f6ffentlichen Ordnung\" als Voraussetzung f\u00fcr die Anordnung einer Freiheitsbeschr\u00e4nkung (Artikel 9 Absatz 1 Aufnahmerichtlinie). Der Begriff der \u00f6ffentlichen Ordnung im Unionsrecht ist aber deutlich enger gefasst.
\nEin Versto\u00df gegen die \u00f6ffentliche Ordnung im Unionsrecht erfordert, \"dass au\u00dfer der sozialen St\u00f6rung, die jeder Gesetzesversto\u00df darstellt, eine tats\u00e4chliche, gegenw\u00e4rtige und hinreichend erhebliche Gefahr vorliegt, die ein Grundinteresse der Gesellschaft ber\u00fchrt\" (siehe etwa EuGH 2015, Rn. 79).
\nDemgegen\u00fcber bezeichnet der nationale Begriff der \u00f6ffentlichen Ordnung die \"Gesamtheit der ungeschriebenen Regeln [\u2026], deren Befolgung nach den jeweils herrschenden sozialen und ethischen Anschauungen als unerl\u00e4ssliche Voraussetzung eines geordneten menschlichen Zusammenlebens innerhalb eines bestimmten Gebiets angesehen wird\" (siehe etwa BVerfG\u00a01985, Rn. 78). Er erfasst nur Verhaltensweisen, die keine geschriebene Rechtsnorm verletzen, da diese bereits im Begriff der \u00f6ffentlichen Sicherheit enthalten sind. Als Grundlage f\u00fcr eine Freiheitsbeschr\u00e4nkung ist er damit zu unscharf und nicht von der Aufnahmerichtlinie gedeckt.
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Die Sekund\u00e4rmigrationszentren, wie sie im GEAS-Anpassungsgesetz vorgesehen sind, sind aus grund-, menschen- und unionsrechtlicher Perspektive abzulehnen. Schon die Unterbringung in Zentren birgt menschenrechtliche Risiken. Umso schwerer wiegen die weitreichenden M\u00f6glichkeiten, gegen\u00fcber den in den Zentren untergebrachten Personen Bewegungsbeschr\u00e4nkungen anzuordnen. Diese bewirken erhebliche Eingriffe in die Freiheit von Schutzsuchenden. Hinzu kommt, dass das Recht auf Gesundheit, der Zugang zu Rechtsberatung und der Schutz von Personen mit besonderen Vulnerabilit\u00e4ten nicht ausreichend gew\u00e4hrleistet werden. Die L\u00e4nder sollten daher von ihrer Erm\u00e4chtigung, solche Zentren einzurichten, keinen Gebrauch machen.
","doi":"https://doi.org/10.59350/w1ghw-50251","guid":"https://fluchtforschung.net/?p=15983","language":"de","license":"https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/legalcode","published_at":1791331200,"rid":"88yme-7y691","summary":"Das \"GEAS-Anpassungsgesetz\" erm\u00f6glicht es den Bundesl\u00e4ndern, besondere Zentren f\u00fcr diejenigen Schutzsuchenden einzurichten, f\u00fcr deren Asylverfahren m\u00f6glicherweise ein anderer EU-Mitgliedstaat zust\u00e4ndig ist. Bislang haben Sachsen, Sachsen-Anhalt und Hamburg erkl\u00e4rt, entsprechende Zentren einzurichten oder bereits eingerichtet.","tags":["Deutsch","Forschung","EU","GEAS","Gemeinsamen Europ\u00e4ischen Asylsystems (GEAS)"],"title":"Menschenrechte in den neuen \"Dublin-Zentren\"?","updated_at":1791380709,"url":"https://fluchtforschung.net/menschenrechte-in-den-neuen-dublin-zentren/","version":"v1"}},{"document":{"authors":[{"affiliation":[{"id":"https://ror.org/02jz4aj89","name":"Maastricht University"}],"contributor_roles":[],"family":"Willighagen","given":"Egon","url":"https://orcid.org/0000-0001-7542-0286"}],"blog":{"authors":[{"name":"Egon Willighagen"}],"community_id":"7f57028e-9d03-489c-b3b4-3d60de06bc9e","created":1710288000,"current_feed_url":"https://chem-bla-ics.linkedchemistry.info/feed.json","description":"Chemblaics (pronounced chem-bla-ics) is the science that uses open science and computers to solve problems in chemistry, biochemistry and related fields.","doi":"https://doi.org/10.59350/chem_bla_ics","favicon":"https://rogue-scholar.org/api/communities/7f57028e-9d03-489c-b3b4-3d60de06bc9e/logo","feed_format":"application/feed+json","feed_url":"https://chem-bla-ics.linkedchemistry.info/archive.json","filter":null,"generator":"Jekyll","home_page_url":"https://chem-bla-ics.linkedchemistry.info","issn":null,"language":"eng","license":"https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/legalcode","prefix":"10.59350","relative_url":null,"secure":true,"slug":"chem_bla_ics","status":"active","subfield":"1606","title":"chem-bla-ics","updated":1791331200,"use_api":true},"blog_name":"chem-bla-ics","blog_slug":"chem_bla_ics","content_html":"Okay, the Pilot\nis over ending with 17 papers, 16 of which have CiTO\nannotations (and so far 4 J.Cheminform. papers\nafter the\npilot), but my interest in the\nCitation Typing Ontology continues and we just need\nmore adoption.
\nDatasets as source of annotations
\nSo, here's a quick Wikidata update. I have been using Wikidata as infrastructure to collect and share CiTO\nannotations (see also the below \"Scholia patch\" posts). Some time ago I recovered my CiteULike CiTO annotations and made this\navailable on Zenodo (doi:10.5281/zenodo.7368209).
\nAnd while thinking about datasets with CiTO annotations, I found two other datasets. One was from an article in Portuguese and one from an\narticle by Peroni et al. with\nthis data file. That data file is actually a zip, but inside the zip file is a CSV file with three\ninteresting columns: cited_doi, citing_doi, and intext_citation.intent. There are many more columns and I can highly recommend browsing\nthem. But these are the three I need to add data to Wikidata. The third column is free text, but using the CiTO for labels, making it\nrelatively easy to convert to citation intentions from Wikidata\n(PS, thanks to Fvtvr3r for adding more!).
So, I had a cleaned file and started writing a Groovy Bioclipse script using Bacting.\nIt basically does a few things: extract all DOIs, check which ones are in Wikidata, analyze the intext_citation.intent column content,\nand then generate QuickStatements (see this gist). Out of the 600\nlines from the input, it creates some 200 new CiTO-annotated citations in Wikidata between\nsome 150 article pairs:
The ability to include CiTO annotations from datasets is another welcome boost for the CiTO statistics in Wikidata.\nThis SPARQL query shows an overview of sources that support the CiTO intention annotation, but note that\na claim with a CiTO intention may also have CrossRef, PubMed, and COCI as reference. In those cases, they are primarily for\nthe citations and not the intention.
\nThere are now (the latest stats are here)\n1202 citation intention annotations in Wikidata for 992 citations from 405 articles in 199 venues. Of these 27 articles have\nexplicit annotations in the article itself and are found in 4 venues, two journals and two preprint servers). These annotated citations\nare to 510 articles in 190 different venues. This Scholia patch will add a new\nstatistics, the number of datasets providing citation intentions, of which there are (as discussed)\ncurrently two in Wikidata.\nThe latter two provide intentions for the majority of articles and are depicted in yellow in the below overview.
\n![\"\"](\"https://chem-bla-ics.linkedchemistry.info/assets/images/Screenshot_20230402_085317.png\"/)
With an annotation in an 1938 article by Alan Turing! I ran into this article in November 2011\nnoting an apparent duplicate title in his article list. I turned out an earlier article had a correction with the same name.\nI added this clarification:
\n![\"\"](\"https://chem-bla-ics.linkedchemistry.info/assets/images/Screenshot_20230402_090600.png\"/)
This is very trivial citation intention data that publishers could provide as open data.
\nOkay, that will do for today. There are actually some really interesting things in the pipeline, but I will have to write about that later. I have some deadlines I should start looking at. Below is some extra reading.\nSome more history
\nOn 15-17 September 2026, members of the Bioconductor, Galaxy and nf-core communities came together at The Open University in Milton Keynes for the BioFAIR Data to Discovery and BioFAIR Collaboration Fest (CoFest) joint event.
\nThe three-day event combined hands-on training with collaborative work on research software interoperability. It was jointly organised by BioFAIR Fellow Marisa Loach and BioFAIR Pathfinder project lead and Institute for Research Software 2026 Fellow Kevin Rue-Albrecht.
\nThe CoFest brought together contributors based in the UK, Ireland, Germany, India and the USA, with both in-person and remote participation.
\nMarisa led the Data to Discovery training, introducing participants to single-cell analysis using the European instance of the Galaxy platform (https://usegalaxy.eu/), while Kevin led the hybrid CoFest focused on making methods developed as Bioconductor R packages more readily accessible through infrastructures such as Galaxy and nf-core.
\nA Galaxy community recap of the event also covers the training and CoFest from the Galaxy perspective.
\nThere are numerous communities in the bioinformatics space focusing on different aspects like code development, making non-code GUIs, creating tutorials and documentation, and more. Some of these are Bioconductor, Galaxy and nf-core, which play complementary roles in bioinformatics. Bioconductor provides a large ecosystem of R packages implementing analysis methods; Galaxy provides an accessible environment for running and sharing reproducible analyses; and nf-core provides a community framework for portable Nextflow pipelines.
\nThe challenge is that making the same method available across these environments often requires separate wrappers, metadata and maintenance. The BioFAIR Pathfinder project behind the event is exploring ways to reduce that duplication, including tooling for adapting Bioconductor methods as Galaxy tools and nf-core modules.
\nA major focus of the CoFest was BiocJobs, an approach being developed that allows analysis tasks to be described alongside Bioconductor packages and used to generate representations for different workflow systems.
\nRather than only discussing interoperability, participants applied this approach to an exemplar single-cell analysis workflow.
\nThe group mapped parts of that workflow to reusable package-level 'BiocJobs' and tested the path from descriptions maintained alongside Bioconductor packages to generated workflow components. Work covered steps including data import, quality control, normalisation, dimensionality reduction and marker analysis.
\nThis gave contributors a concrete way to test the process, improve documentation, and identify what would be needed to make it easier for others to contribute.
\n![\"Photo](\"https://blog.bioconductor.org/posts/2026-10-07-biofair-cofest/participants.jpg\"/)
On the final day, we captured the workflow we had been working towards in a single diagram: from a commit to a Bioconductor package repository, through the automatic building and publishing of tool wrappers, to their use in Galaxy, nf-core and other workflow environments.
\n![\"Workflow](\"https://blog.bioconductor.org/posts/2026-10-07-biofair-cofest/biocjobs-workflow.jpg\"/)
Three days were not enough to fully implement the workflow captured in the diagram - nor was that the goal. Instead, the CoFest demonstrated the process on a small number of selected workflow steps, while documenting how others could contribute. This created a foundation for onboarding new contributors and, over time, enabling more contributors to create wrappers for other widely used Bioconductor methods.
\nOne of the clearest lessons was that interoperability is not just about writing software that connects one platform to another.
\nIt also depends on deciding where information should live, who is best placed to maintain it, and how contributions can fit naturally into the practices of each community. Bringing Bioconductor package developers, Galaxy contributors, and nf-core developers into the same room made it possible to look at the process end to end rather than from the perspective of a single ecosystem.
\nThe event also reinforced the value of working from a concrete scientific use case. Using a real single-cell workflow gave participants something shared to build, test and discuss, while exposing questions that would have been difficult to anticipate from design discussions alone. The CoFest notes capture several of those emerging questions, particularly around how reusable jobs should be structured and composed.
\nThe CoFest was intended as a starting point rather than a one-off sprint.
\nThe immediate next step is to continue refining the workflow demonstrated during the event: improving the tooling and documentation, testing it on additional Bioconductor methods, and making it easier for new contributors to take part.
\nWe are also planning follow-up events in the first quarter of 2027. These will provide an opportunity to bring the communities together again, build on the examples developed in Milton Keynes and involve more contributors in extending the approach to other widely used methods.
\nThe longer-term aim is simple: make it easier for software developed in one research community to become useful, sustainable building blocks in another.
\nInterested in getting involved? Join the Bioconductor Zulip and the #biofair2026-workflow-sprint channel and follow the BiocJobs topic for ongoing discussion.
\n\n\u00a9 2026 Bioconductor. Content is published under Creative Commons CC-BY-4.0 License for the text and BSD 3-Clause License for any code. | R-Bloggers\n
","doi":"https://doi.org/10.59350/0h4ec-srk87","guid":"https://blog.bioconductor.org/posts/2026-10-07-biofair-cofest/","image":"https://blog.bioconductor.org/posts/2026-10-07-biofair-cofest/biocjobs-workflow.jpg","language":"en","license":"https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/legalcode","published_at":1791331200,"rid":"6bxj1-6dg44","summary":"On 15-17 September 2026, members of the Bioconductor, Galaxy and nf-core communities came together at The Open University in Milton Keynes for the BioFAIR Data to Discovery and BioFAIR Collaboration Fest (CoFest) joint event. The three-day event combined hands-on training with collaborative work on research software interoperability.","tags":["Bioconductor","FAIR","Hackathon","Galaxy","Nf-core"],"title":"A Collaboration Fest for research software interoperability","updated_at":1791365704,"url":"https://blog.bioconductor.org/posts/2026-10-07-biofair-cofest/","version":"v1"}},{"document":{"authors":[{"contributor_roles":[],"family":"Eden","given":"Terence"}],"content_html":"Recently, my blog was featured on Coil's list of monetised content. I'd like to take a little time to explain what Web Monetisation is, how to get set up with it, and what my thoughts are.
\n\nStick this line in the <head> of your HTML page.
<meta name=\"monetization\" content=\"$ilp.uphold.com/ieELEKD7epqw\">\nThat's it.
\n\nYou should replace my uphold address with your own. Unless you want me to get paid for your work.
\n\nThis is a draft specification for seamless payments on the web.
\n\nThis gives a website visitor a few ways to pay to use a website.
\n\nThere's a lot more to it than that - obviously - but that'll do as a brief explanation.
\n\nI was asked to beta test Coil - so that's what this section will focus on.
\n\nThey have a pretty simple guide to getting started. In theory, you can choose a variety of payment providers. I went with Uphold because they don't require you to use a shitty pseudo-currency based on half-baked Blockchain tech. You can get your money in pounds, pesos, pa\u02bbanga, or most other world currencies.
\n\nUphold, like any reputable financial institution, has to perform a Know Your Customer check. The usual thing of sending in copies of your ID and proving you are who you claim. Nothing too arduous.
\n\nOnce you have an \"Interledger Payments\" address - $ilp.uphold.com/ieELEKD7epqw - you can use it to start receiving payments from visitors.
Coil has a range of plugins for things like WordPress, and can even connect your YouTube and Twitch accounts to enable monetisation there.
\n\nWe need a better way to pay for the web - because advertising sucks. At best it is boorish and irrelevant interruptions. At worst it is... well, look around you.
\n\nUnfortunately, as popular as my blog is, I quite often get notifications like this:
\n\n![\"A](\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/wp-content/uploads/2020/10/1p.jpeg\")
\n\nI know every penny helps - but that's a bit ridiculous!
\n\nIt's a chicken-and-egg problem. But I think it's important that content creators take the first step. Start putting the meta elements on your pages now. Get the content and infrastructure there, and wait for consumers to catch up.
\n\nCoil could do with a bit more fine grained detail on where payments are coming from. It would be useful for me to know which of my pages performs best, or whether payments have come from YouTube or Twitch. But it is early days - I'm excited to see how it develops.
\n\nSo, get started now with Web Monetisation - and perhaps we can rid the web of the scourge of advertising.
![](\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/wp-content/themes/edent-wordpress-theme/info/okgo.php?ID=36865&HTTP_REFERER=DOI\"){kind=small}
","doi":"https://doi.org/10.59350/egs7p-7g234","guid":"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/?p=36865","image":"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/wp-content/uploads/2020/01/Storm-Trooper-Chocolate-Money.jpg","language":"en","license":"https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/legalcode","published_at":1602028800,"rid":"83yzt-4xx94","summary":"Recently, my blog was featured on Coil's list of monetised content. I'd like to take a little time to explain what Web Monetisation is, how to get set up with it, and what my thoughts are. Quickstart Stick this line in the of your HTML page. That's it. You should replace my uphold address with your own.","tags":["/etc/","HTML5","Money","Web"],"title":"Adding Web Monetization to your site using Coil","updated_at":1791363250,"url":"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2020/10/adding-web-monetization-to-your-site-using-coil/","version":"v1"}},{"document":{"authors":[{"contributor_roles":[],"family":"Eden","given":"Terence"}],"content_html":"I'm an idiot. I ran a new version of Firefox nightly without creating a new profile. When I went to run my regular Firefox, I got this error message:
\n\n![\"Using](\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/wp-content/uploads/2021/10/Screenshot-from-2021-10-04-21-32-37.png\")
\n\nHere's how I fixed it.
\n\nfirefox --allow-downgradeabout:profiles![\"Screenshot](\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/wp-content/uploads/2021/10/profiles.png\")
firefox --allow-downgradeThat should do it! Next time you start Firefox normally, everything should be fine. Probably.
\n\nIn the future, make backups of your $HOME directory, and create a new profile for your Nightlies!
![](\"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/wp-content/themes/edent-wordpress-theme/info/okgo.php?ID=40549&HTTP_REFERER=DOI\"){kind=small}
","doi":"https://doi.org/10.59350/cd0qg-f3y50","guid":"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/?p=40549","image":"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/wp-content/uploads/2021/10/Screenshot-from-2021-10-04-21-32-37.png","language":"en","license":"https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/legalcode","published_at":1633564800,"rid":"ftcv1-wbh67","summary":"I'm an idiot. I ran a new version of Firefox nightly without creating a new profile. When I went to run my regular Firefox, I got this error message: Here's how I fixed it. Close down Firefox Open a terminal and run: firefox --allow-downgrade Let Firefox start up and create a new profile.","tags":["/etc/","Firefox","Linux","Ubuntu"],"title":"How to fix an upgraded Firefox profile","updated_at":1791363249,"url":"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2021/10/how-to-fix-an-upgraded-firefox-profile/","version":"v1"}},{"document":{"authors":[{"contributor_roles":[],"family":"Jehn","given":"Florian Ulrich","url":"https://orcid.org/0000-0002-7296-8008"}],"blog":{"authors":null,"community_id":"86cf2e28-4644-41b0-9d6d-66444a612b18","created":1751500800,"current_feed_url":null,"description":"Thoughts about existential risk, history, climate, food security and societal collapse.","doi":"https://doi.org/10.59350/existentialcrunch","favicon":"https://rogue-scholar.org/api/communities/86cf2e28-4644-41b0-9d6d-66444a612b18/logo","feed_format":"application/rss+xml","feed_url":"https://existentialcrunch.substack.com/feed","filter":null,"generator":"Substack","home_page_url":"https://existentialcrunch.substack.com","issn":null,"language":"eng","license":"https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/legalcode","prefix":"10.59350","relative_url":null,"secure":true,"slug":"existentialcrunch","status":"active","subfield":"2306","title":"Existential Crunch","updated":1791360938,"use_api":true},"blog_name":"Existential Crunch","blog_slug":"existentialcrunch","content_html":"![\"\"](\"https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/$s_!mfb6!,f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F29b9cc41-0730-4efe-9e99-abb6d6ec3f51_624x841.png\")
Time for updates again! Besides new references, there's also something else I wanted to share. I had the great opportunity to publish in the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists. In the article, I give an overview of how nuclear war would impact the global food system. Might be an interesting read if you subscribe to this blog here.
I would also be interested in your thoughts. Blogging can sometimes feel a bit one sided. So, if this blog here has been helpful for you, I would love to hear about it in the comments! Also, let me know if you have ideas how this could be more useful for you.
And now the actual updates:
One big factor that has come up in many of the papers I have been reading for this blog is inequality. It is just generally corrosive to societies if it gets too high. A recent preprint by myself and Dan Hoyer extends this argument to say that high inequality is also an important contributor to global catastrophic risk.
This argument of showing that inequality is relevant to global catastrophic risk has been made more extensively by Jehn & Hoyer (2026). This study is a review that makes the argument that inequality and global catastrophic risk are rising at the same time and that these two trends are not disconnected. The argument is mostly based on historical findings that inequality has corrosive effects on both state capacity and social cohesion, but that those two properties are essential to allow societies to react to large catastrophes. These examples come from both deeper history, as well as more recent research around how modern democracies handle natural hazards. In both cases those societies with lower inequality tend to fare better. Also, democracies seem to be the form of government that invests most in prevention of global catastrophes, as shown by national risk registers. This also means that reducing inequality is important from a second angle: democracies are best when it comes to global catastrophic risk, but they are also especially vulnerable to high inequality, as this undermines democratic legitimacy.
If people feel left behind in their own countries, this increases the chance of leaders getting elected who promise to restore order and blame problems on outsiders. Such leaders likely turn towards protectionism and away from multilateral institutions. This matters because global catastrophe is often connected to coordination problems, especially between countries. An example of this would be global food trade, which could be easily disrupted by countries introducing export bans. So the same inequality that makes a society less able to cope internally also makes it worse at the kind of cooperation that catastrophes demand.
These kinds of processes could introduce a dangerous loop against global resilience. Inequality weakens democratic functioning, weak democracies produce leaders who do not address inequality because the resentment is useful to them, those leaders undermine international cooperation, and the crises that follow do not reduce inequality either. This is more speculative than the historical findings above, but if it holds, reducing inequality is possibly a prerequisite to enable the international collaboration that is needed to be safe from global catastrophic risk.
When we look into history, climate often comes up as an important factor that shapes the fate of societies. Climate in turn can be greatly impacted by volcanic eruptions. I added three papers to the post that look deeper into the consequences of large eruptions.
The research group around Ulf B\u00fcngten also did a follow up review to this study a few years later (B\u00fcntgen et al., 2025). This one is an extensive review and not original research. What they find in the literature is that roughly every 50 years there is an eruption that is big enough to impact climate on a level which is meaningful for human societies. Though, there can also be much more intensive eruptive episodes. For example, the period 1783 to 1835 had five significant eruptions. For most of these eruptions the climate is strongly influenced for around three years, but takes around two decades to get completely back to pre-eruption baselines. Also, the behavior can differ between global and local scales. Even smaller eruptions can potentially have strong local climate impacts, while globally there is not much difference. The impact can also change by season. Generally, there is way less research about temperature impacts in winter, because most of the climate data following eruptions is from tree rings, which do not grow in winter anyway. Additionally, there are still climate impacts in the historical record, which we cannot attribute to any specific volcano, showing how little we actually know.
In addition to these broad studies, we can also look at specific volcanic impacts. One example here comes from Kaniewski et al. (2025). They looked at the Little Ice Age (~1250 to ~1860) in particular and mapped all the rebellions and revolutions that happened during that time period. What they find is that climate is an important stressor. Their key results are:
In times of declining solar activity (when it gets colder) we find more rebellions and revolutions.
The drier and colder a period is, the more rebellions and revolutions there are.
Rebellions and revolutions are usually preceded by rising grain prices.
However, what they also find is that often societies can come through dry and cold periods mostly unharmed if they react properly. Their go to example is England, which managed to make it through many rough periods without rebellions and revolutions, because it was able to suck in additional resources through its empire.
Even more into detail goes Huhtamaa et al. (2022). Their argument is that if you want to understand volcanic impacts, it makes much more sense to look at how the same society reacted to different volcanic eruptions. They pick Finland to study this and find that generally, the more destabilized your society is when the volcano erupts, the stronger the impact will be. To study this they looked at temperature data and grain harvest fluctuations to assess the climate and food system impacts and at how many farms get deserted as a proxy for how well the society is in general. Using this, they look at the impacts of three separate volcanic eruptions that had a similar atmospheric impact. They find for all three eruptions that temperatures go down and yields decline, but that the desertion rate of farms differ. For one of the eruptions the society was already quite stressed due to war and we see a spike in desertion rates. However, in a later eruption, the state introduced extensive agroeconomic relief measures and the desertion rate stayed lower. Though, even with these measures, the impacts were significant, especially for the poorer parts of society.
One important argument I am trying to make on this blog here, is that democracies are likely more resilient to all kinds of hazards than non-democratic societies. Switzerland especially seems to be pretty good in planning ahead. I added a short mention of a report that analyzed the Swiss food system:
Switzerland seems to have a pretty good risk assessment in comparison to many other countries. In addition to the extensive national risk assessment, they have also invested in building a model of the Swiss food system (Zimmermann et al., 2017). This model is used to assess how the Swiss population could be fed in a variety of catastrophes and finds that they likely could feed their population in a lot of scenarios, but that this would mean strong changes in dietary habits.
Thank you for your interest in this academic experiment. Here's a great song as an appreciation.
If this post (or others here) got you thinking, consider leaving a like. It helps more people stumble onto this blog.
As you made it this deep, I assume that you like the stuff that is written here. If you want to do me a little favor, I would really appreciate it if you could share your favorite post with someone who might enjoy it.
Go ahead, you can do it right now. Nothing more to read in this post anyway.
Much appreciated!
Thanks for reading! If you want to talk about this post or societal collapse in general, I'd be happy to have a chat. Just send me an email to existential_crunch at posteo.de and we can schedule something.
B\u00fcntgen, U., Cosmo, N. D., Esper, J., Frachetti, M., Khalidi, L., Mauelshagen, F., Rohland, E., & Oppenheimer, C. (2025). Volcanoes, Climate, and Society. https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev-earth-032524-013254
Huhtamaa, H., Stoffel, M., & Corona, C. (2022). Recession or resilience? Long-range socioeconomic consequences of the 17th century volcanic eruptions in northern Fennoscandia. Climate of the Past, 18(9), 2077\u20132092. https://doi.org/10.5194/cp-18-2077-2022
Jehn, F. U., & Hoyer, D. (2026). Inequality's contribution to global catastrophic risk. EarthArXiv. https://eartharxiv.org/repository/view/12164/
Kaniewski, D., Marriner, N., Luce, F., Escarpe, M., Pourkerman, M., & Otto, T. (2025). A climate of conflict: How the little ice age sparked rebellions and revolutions across Europe. Global and Planetary Change, 254, 105038. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.gloplacha.2025.105038
Zimmermann, A., Ferjani, A., Mann, S., Haudenschild, U., Mittelholzer, M., & M\u00fcller, P. (2017). Ern\u00e4hrungspotenzial der landwirtschaftlichen Kulturfl\u00e4chen: Analyse einer optimierten Inlandproduktion von Nahrungsmitteln im Fall von schweren Mangellagen. Bundesamt f\u00fcr wirtschaftliche Landesversorgung (BWL).
High on the Qinghai-Xizang Plateau, often called the \"Roof of the World,\" a new species of snake waits beneath the stones…
\n\n\n\nScientists from Yibin University and collaborating institutions have formally described Indotyphlops gyirongensis, the Gyirong blind snake, a discovery that adds a new member to one of the least understood branches of the snake family tree.
\n\n\n\n![\"\"](\"https://i0.wp.com/blog.pensoft.net/wp-content/uploads/2026/10/oo_1776840-1.jpg?ssl=1\")
Blind snakes are small, burrowing reptiles that spend nearly their entire lives underground. Their secretive habits and similar appearances make them notoriously difficult to study.
\n\n\n\nThe family Typhlopidae contains roughly 280 species, yet its relationships remain poorly resolved, and new species continue to surface wherever researchers look carefully. Until now, no blind snake had ever been recorded in the Xizang Autonomous Region, which makes this find a first for the area.
\n\n\n\nThe single specimen, an adult female, was collected in August 2025 at an elevation of 2,262 metres, close to the border between China and Nepal. She was resting beneath a stone at the edge of an evergreen broad-leaved forest, where deep humus and a thick layer of fallen leaves create ideal conditions for a creature that lives by burrowing. Among her neighbours were a Himalayan pit viper and a Himalayan toad!
\n\n\n\n![\"\"](\"https://i0.wp.com/blog.pensoft.net/wp-content/uploads/2026/10/oo_1776842.jpg?ssl=1\")
The snake itself is slender and elegant. At 265 millimetres, it is large by the standards of its genus, yet it measures just 3.5 millimetres across at midbody. Its glossy scales are light brown, each one darker on its rear half, which gives the body a delicate and finely patterned sheen. The underside is cream and so thin-skinned that it is partly transparent to the internal organs.
\n\n\n\nMost distinctive is its pale cream head cap, which lacks pigment as far back as the eye. The eye itself is only a dark spot, with no visible pupil or iris, fitting for an animal that navigates by touch and chemical cues rather than sight. Its tail ends in a small nubbin rather than a sharp spine.
\n\n\n\nSome of the most telling differences are hidden in the arrangement of the scales along the lip. Blind snakes are classified partly by how their upper lip scales overlap the shields above them. In nearly all of the snake's relatives, the third scale overlaps the one beside the eye, a pattern known as T-III.
\n\n\n\nThe Gyirong blind snake shows a rarer arrangement, called T-V, in which both the second and third lip scales overlap the shields above. Few documented members of its genus share this feature, which provides a clean and reliable way to separate it from most of its kin.
\n\n\n\nAnatomy alone did not settle the matter. The team sequenced two mitochondrial genes and placed the snake within a broad evolutionary tree. It nested firmly within Indotyphlops, as the sister lineage to I. albiceps, but its genetic divergence was substantial. For one gene, it differed from its closest relatives with available data by more than 24 per cent, and for another by more than 18 per cent, margins far beyond what is typically seen within a single species.
\n\n\n\nThe name honours the place of discovery. Gyirongensis refers to Gyirong Town in Gyirong County, where the holotype was found, and it is formed as a noun in apposition. The authors propose the English common name \"Gyirong blind snake\" and the Chinese name \u5409\u9686\u76f2\u86c7 (J\u00edl\u00f3ng M\u00e1ngsh\u00e9).
\n\n\n\n![\"\"](\"https://i0.wp.com/blog.pensoft.net/wp-content/uploads/2026/10/oo_1776838.jpg?ssl=1\")
Because the type locality sits so close to the Nepalese border, the researchers consider it highly likely that the species also lives on the other side, thus pending further fieldwork.
\n\n\n\nOriginal source:
\n\n\n\nLyu B, Tan S, Zhao Z, Wallach V, Liu Q, Guo P (2026) A new species of blind snake, Indotyphlops (Serpentes, Typhlopidae), from the Qinghai-Xizang Plateau, China. ZooKeys 1292: 261-273. https://doi.org/10.3897/zookeys.1292.197322
\n\n\n\nFor more articles on zoology, visit the ZooKeys website and follow the journal on BlueSky and Facebook.
\n\n","doi":"https://doi.org/10.59350/bevq4-rc013","guid":"https://blog.pensoft.net/?p=21081","image":"https://blog.pensoft.net/wp-content/uploads/2026/10/SciComm-PR-2026-Instagram-2026-10-02T120406.577.png","language":"en","license":"https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/legalcode","published_at":1791158400,"rid":"eq0f7-sw868","summary":"Tweet High on the Qinghai-Xizang Plateau, often called the \"Roof of the World,\" a new species of snake waits beneath the stones\u2026 Scientists from Yibin University and collaborating institutions have formally described Indotyphlops gyirongensis , the Gyirong blind snake, a discovery that adds a new member to one of the least understood branches of the snake family tree.","tags":["Zookeys","Biodiversity","Blind Snake","Fieldwork","Nepal"],"title":"A Blind Snake on the Roof of the World: New Burrowing Species Discovered Beneath the Stones of the Qinghai-Xizang Plateau","updated_at":1791358254,"url":"https://blog.pensoft.net/2026/10/05/a-blind-snake-on-the-roof-of-the-world-new-burrowing-species-discovered-beneath-the-stones-of-the-qinghai-xizang-plateau/","version":"v1"}},{"document":{"authors":[{"contributor_roles":[],"name":"Pensoft Editorial Team"}],"blog":{"authors":null,"community_id":"1e54953c-587a-4743-89af-ebd2cb45660c","created":1789516800,"current_feed_url":null,"description":null,"doi":"https://doi.org/10.59350/pensoft","favicon":"https://rogue-scholar.org/api/communities/1e54953c-587a-4743-89af-ebd2cb45660c/logo","feed_format":"application/atom+xml","feed_url":"https://blog.pensoft.net/feed/atom/","filter":null,"generator":"WordPress","home_page_url":"https://blog.pensoft.net/","issn":null,"language":"eng","license":"https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/legalcode","prefix":"10.59350","relative_url":null,"secure":true,"slug":"pensoft","status":"active","subfield":"2303","title":"Pensoft Blog","updated":1791294673,"use_api":true},"blog_name":"Pensoft Blog","blog_slug":"pensoft","content_html":"\n\nThere is a Chinese saying that east or west, Guilin scenery is the best. Guilin and Chongqing, located in the western part of China, are famous for their many mountains and rivers. They also harbor unique flora and fauna, such as the scaly-sided merganser, a globally endangered species restricted to eastern Asia.
\n\n\n\nIn 2023 and 2024, Dr. Yitong Ma from Nantong University, China, collected springtail specimens from the Huaping Nature Reserve in Guilin and the Yintiaoling Nature Reserve in Chongqing.
\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nSpringtails are the most common arthropods living in the soil – you can find them in your yard, in the flowerpot, or on the lawn,
\nhe says.
\"Although they are very small, usually 2-3 mm in length, their density can be amazing. As decomposers, they can break down the organic matter and promote material cycling, so they play an important key role in soil ecosystems.\"
\n\n\n\nAfter checking the specimens from the two reserves under microscopes, Dr. Ma and his colleague from Nantong University, Xiaowei Qian, found rich biodiversity and about 80 different species of springtails. In a study published in the open-access journal ZooKeys, they described five new scaled species belonging to three genera of the springtail family Entomobryidae.
\n\n\n\nThe genus Lepidodens contains five species, all found in China. The researchers find one new species, which is also the first species of the genus from the western part of China.
\n\n\n\n![\"Lepidodens](\"https://i0.wp.com/blog.pensoft.net/wp-content/uploads/2026/06/oo_1569973.jpg?ssl=1\")
They also report the first sighting in China of the genus Lepidosira, which thrives best in Oceania. In Huaping Nature Reserve and Yintiaoling Nature Reserve, they found three new species of the genus.
\n\n\n\nAmong the fifty species of the genus Willowsia in the world, about 30 species have been reported from China. However, the authors concluded this genus is not well represented in the two reserves, and only found one new species in Chongqing.
\n\n\n\n![\"Willowsia](\"https://i0.wp.com/blog.pensoft.net/wp-content/uploads/2026/06/oo_1569997.jpg?ssl=1\")
In the future, the researchers will further study those specimens collected from the two reserves.
\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nGiven the subtropical monsoon climate, mountainous topography and little human disturbance of the reserves, it is likely that more new species will be found,
\nthey say.
Original source:
\n\n\n\nQian X-W, Ma Y-T (2026) Five new species of Entomobryinae (Collembola, Entomobryidae) from China. ZooKeys 1275: 81-115. https://doi.org/10.3897/zookeys.1275.158254
\n\n","doi":"https://doi.org/10.59350/h2syw-84k40","guid":"https://blog.pensoft.net/?p=19054","image":"https://blog.pensoft.net/wp-content/uploads/2026/06/Annual-Awards-Editors-Choice-2025-19.png","language":"en","license":"https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/legalcode","published_at":1781740800,"rid":"xfscr-gh359","summary":"Tweet There is a Chinese saying that east or west, Guilin scenery is the best. Guilin and Chongqing, located in the western part of China, are famous for their many mountains and rivers. They also harbor unique flora and fauna, such as the scaly-sided merganser, a globally endangered species restricted to eastern Asia.","tags":["Zookeys","Biodiversity","Invertebrates","Lepidodens","New Species"],"title":"Beautiful Scenery, Rich Biodiversity: New Springtail Species Discovered In China","updated_at":1791358251,"url":"https://blog.pensoft.net/2026/06/18/beautiful-scenery-rich-bodiversity-new-springtail-species-discovered-in-china/","version":"v1"}},{"document":{"authors":[{"contributor_roles":[],"name":"Pensoft Editorial Team"}],"blog":{"authors":null,"community_id":"1e54953c-587a-4743-89af-ebd2cb45660c","created":1789516800,"current_feed_url":null,"description":null,"doi":"https://doi.org/10.59350/pensoft","favicon":"https://rogue-scholar.org/api/communities/1e54953c-587a-4743-89af-ebd2cb45660c/logo","feed_format":"application/atom+xml","feed_url":"https://blog.pensoft.net/feed/atom/","filter":null,"generator":"WordPress","home_page_url":"https://blog.pensoft.net/","issn":null,"language":"eng","license":"https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/legalcode","prefix":"10.59350","relative_url":null,"secure":true,"slug":"pensoft","status":"active","subfield":"2303","title":"Pensoft Blog","updated":1791294673,"use_api":true},"blog_name":"Pensoft Blog","blog_slug":"pensoft","content_html":"\n\nBetween 13-17 September 2026, Pensoft Publishers joined the Nordic Oikos-Gf\u00d6 2026 conference, jointly organised by the Nordic Society Oikos and the Ecological Society of Germany, Austria and Switzerland (Gf\u00d6) in Odense, Denmark.
\n\n\n\nThemed \"Integrating the Diversity of Ecology\", the event welcomed over 1,000 researchers in the field from across career stages, who had the opportunity to enjoy conference talks across 36 thematic sessions, as many as six keynote talks, two poster sessions, several open society meetings and quite a few social events, including excursions and a conference dinner.
\n\n\n\n![\"\"](\"https://i0.wp.com/blog.pensoft.net/wp-content/uploads/2026/09/20260917_120130-scaled.jpg?ssl=1\")
Throughout the scientific event, conference delegates had the opportunity to also explore the various publishing services offered by Pensoft to authors of research, journal managers, conference organisers; the diverse portfolio of almost 100 open-access peer-reviewed journals published on Pensoft's ARPHA Publishing Platform.
\n\n\n\nBeyond publishing solutions, a key focus was given to OBSGESSION: a Horizon Europe-funded project where Pensoft is actively involved. To better understand and predict changes in terrestrial and freshwater ecosystems, the OBSGESSION consortium integrates multi-source Earth Observation data (such as high-resolution satellite imagery and drone monitoring) with ground-based in-situ research, including advanced environmental DNA (eDNA) sampling. By coupling these data streams with cutting-edge detection-attribution modelling and machine learning algorithms, the project generates scalable Essential Biodiversity Variables (EBVs). These ecological approaches and analytical frameworks are actively tested and validated through six biodiversity pilots across diverse European ecosystems. In the open-science Research Ideas and Outcomes journal, you can find a collection of project outputs, including research papers, project reports and deliverables, and guideline papers published across journals and platforms.
\n\n\n\nAs a leader of the \"Dissemination, Multi-stakeholder outreach and synergies\" work package at OBSGESSION, Pensoft is tasked with stakeholder engagement and community building, ultimately contributing to the high impact of the resulting outputs, methodologies and policy recommendations that aim to strengthen public understanding of biodiversity change.
\n\n\n\n*
\n\n\n\nOne of the six keynote talks was presented by Prof. Dr. Isabell Hensen (Martin Luther University Halle, Germany), who received the Gf\u00d6 Honorary Medal 2026 for her leading, forward-looking contributions to ecological research and the scientific community. Her work examines how genetic variation, environmental conditions, disturbance, and plant-animal interactions shape plant populations, with particular emphasis on rare species, biological invasions, and the regeneration of degraded forests.
\n\n\n\n![](\"https://i0.wp.com/blog.pensoft.net/wp-content/uploads/2026/09/20260914_163906-scaled.jpg?w=840&ssl=1\")
![](\"https://i0.wp.com/blog.pensoft.net/wp-content/uploads/2026/09/20260914_165325-scaled.jpg?w=840&ssl=1\")
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In her talk, titled \"One spark is enough: regeneration ecology of Andean forests under global change\", she reported on post-fire regeneration processes in tropical Andean forests, based on long-term field experiments and observational studies.
\n\n\n\nHensen focused on the well-studied endemic plant genus Polylepis, which forms the world's highest-elevation forests and illustrates how fire has shaped ecosystem dynamics over millennia. Her talk also mentioned a 2022 monograph of the genus, published in the Pensoft journal PhytoKeys by Tatiana Erika Boza Espinoza (Pontificia Universidad Cat\u00f3lica del Per\u00fa) and Michael Kessler (University of Zurich), which brought together results from 35 years of field and herbarium experience.
\n\n\n\n*
\n\n\n\nOn Wednesday, Pensoft's Iva Boyadzhieva delivered a presentation titled “Scholarly Communication: Lessons from the Publisher’s Kitchen”. She highlighted the vital role publishers play in helping researchers communicate their insights not only to peers, but also to decision-makers and the public. Emphasizing the publisher’s responsibility to support authors with robust infrastructure and dedicated human expertise, she outlined how Pensoft works to FAIRify scholarly publishing and future-proof scientific knowledge in an era of rapid AI development and expanding research output.
\n\n\n\n![](\"https://i0.wp.com/blog.pensoft.net/wp-content/uploads/2026/09/Nordic-gfo-talk-by-Iva-2026-10-1.png?w=840\")
![](\"https://i0.wp.com/blog.pensoft.net/wp-content/uploads/2026/09/Nordic-gfo-talk-by-Iva-2026-3-1.png?w=840\")
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*
\n\n\n\nPensoft's team was delighted to meet up with dedicated readers, authors, reviewers, and editors from across Pensoft's portfolio, as well as introduce Pensoft journals to attendees discovering them for the first time.
\n\n\n\n![](\"https://i0.wp.com/blog.pensoft.net/wp-content/uploads/2026/09/20260914_113802-scaled.jpg?w=840\")
![](\"https://i0.wp.com/blog.pensoft.net/wp-content/uploads/2026/09/20260914_101404-scaled.jpg?w=840\")
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![](\"https://i0.wp.com/blog.pensoft.net/wp-content/uploads/2026/09/20260914_104900_1-scaled.jpg?w=840\")
Unsurprisingly, well-established society journals published by Pensoft, such as Frontiers of Biogeography, NeoBiota, Vegetation Classification and Survey, Vegetation Ecology and Diversity and Italian Botanist drew plenty of attention, alongside long-standing Pensoft's own titles like Nature Conservation, PhytoKeys, One Ecosystem and the Biodiversity Data Journal.
\n\n\n\nVisitors were also particularly intrigued by several newly launched Pensoft journals. Developed in close collaboration with passionate researchers, these fresh outlets directly address key gaps in academic publishing.
\n\n\n\nOne of the newly launched journals in the spotlight was Agricultural and Environmental Modelling (AEM), which provides a unique scholarly outlet thanks to its modern approach to publishing by increasing transparency, giving credit to research objects across the entire modelling research lifecycle. This is achieved through publishing specialised article types, such as: Formal Model, Model Testing and Calibration, Model Implementation and Documentation, Data Papers and Software Descriptions. These new publishing formats are designed to keep pace with advances in Modelling research and to make it FAIR (Findable, Accessible, Interoperable, and Reusable) by enabling scholarly credit for diverse research outputs, often created by different groups of authors. For the time being, AEM remains a Diamond Open Access journal, meaning that it will not charge authors for open-access publication.\u00a0
\n\n\n\nOther recently founded journals addressing emerging and fast-developing disciplines within the ecological field that took the spotlight were:
\n\n\n\nAll of these journals operate with no article fees for either authors, nor readers.
\n\n\n\nTo receive updates on new publications and relevant news, sign up for Email Alerts on any journal's homepage. Creating a Pensoft account also allows users to easily customise their notification preferences, follow additional journals, or filter updates by research topic. You can also follow journals on social media, including BlueSky, Facebook and Linkedin.
\n\n\n\n*
\n\n\n\nDelegates at the event showed strong interest in OBSGESSION's first policy brief: \"Prioritising Essential Biodiversity Variables (EBVs) to support European Union (EU) policy needs based on the EU's Biodiversity Strategy for 2030.\" To tackle a critical challenge in environmental monitoring, OBSGESSION focuses on prioritising key EBVs to directly support the EU Biodiversity Strategy 2030 – a roadmap designed to put Europe's biodiversity on a path to recovery through 102 specific actions and sub-actions.
\n\n\n\nTo align these policy needs with actionable data, the OBSGESSION team conducted an assessment to identify priority EBV candidates. By categorising EBV-applicable actions and indicators across different ecosystem realms and implementation stages, the project pinpointed the most essential variables needed to strengthen monitoring, reporting, and policy execution. The document is based on a deliverable by the project (D1.1 Policy Landscape and Needs Assessment).
\n\n\n\nThis policy brief is part of a broader, ongoing effort within OBSGESSION to bridge the gap between biodiversity data and policy execution. To dive deeper into the science behind this topic, the project has hosted a dedicated seminar series exploring key aspects of the framework:
\n\n\n\nBeyond theoretical frameworks, OBSGESSION grounds its research in six biodiversity validation pilots across Europe. The case studies represent European biodiversity and ecosystem conservation challenges at scales varying from local to regional. Full details on each ecosystem pilot are now available in a collection of newly published pilot factsheets, which made their debut at the conference, where people could take a look at their digital versions.
\n\n\n\nReading those materials gives an insight into the practical testing environment to demonstrate how Earth observation, field research, and ecological modelling come together to deliver actionable biodiversity insights. You can also check out OBSGESSION's biodiversity pilots on the project's website.
\n\n\n\n*
\n\n\n\nTo relive the conference by exploring the detailed programme alongside the full abstracts, visit the conference website.
\n\n\n\nKeep up with future updates and news from Pensoft by following us on Bluesky, Facebook, X, and LinkedIn.
\n\n","doi":"https://doi.org/10.59350/0261d-tmz21","guid":"https://blog.pensoft.net/?p=20944","image":"https://blog.pensoft.net/wp-content/uploads/2026/09/SciComm-PR-2026-Instagram-2026-09-25T164847.347-e1790348402124.png","language":"en","license":"https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/legalcode","published_at":1790640000,"rid":"1zdgz-txj12","summary":"Between 13-17 September 2026, Pensoft Publishers joined the Nordic Oikos-Gf\u00d6 2026 conference in Odense, Denmark.","tags":["Advances In Pollinator Research","Agricultural And Environmental Modelling","Biodiversity Data Journal","BioRisk","Frontiers Of Biogeography"],"title":"Pensoft at the Nordic Oikos-Gf\u00d6 2026 conference: Integrating the Diversity of Ecology","updated_at":1791358247,"url":"https://blog.pensoft.net/2026/09/29/pensoft-at-the-nordic-oikos-gfo-2026-conference-integrating-the-diversity-of-ecology/","version":"v1"}},{"document":{"authors":[{"contributor_roles":[],"name":"Pensoft Editorial Team"}],"blog":{"authors":null,"community_id":"1e54953c-587a-4743-89af-ebd2cb45660c","created":1789516800,"current_feed_url":null,"description":null,"doi":"https://doi.org/10.59350/pensoft","favicon":"https://rogue-scholar.org/api/communities/1e54953c-587a-4743-89af-ebd2cb45660c/logo","feed_format":"application/atom+xml","feed_url":"https://blog.pensoft.net/feed/atom/","filter":null,"generator":"WordPress","home_page_url":"https://blog.pensoft.net/","issn":null,"language":"eng","license":"https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/legalcode","prefix":"10.59350","relative_url":null,"secure":true,"slug":"pensoft","status":"active","subfield":"2303","title":"Pensoft Blog","updated":1791294673,"use_api":true},"blog_name":"Pensoft Blog","blog_slug":"pensoft","content_html":"\n\nLast week marked another annual meeting of the Biodiversity Information Standards network, otherwise known as TDWG, with the Norwegian capital Oslo hosting the event between 21 and 25 September.
\n\n\n\nTDWG is the international, non-profit organisation formerly known as the Taxonomic Databases Working Group, which develops and maintains the standards, such as Darwin Core, that allow biodiversity data to be shared, integrated and understood across institutions worldwide.
\n\n\n\nThe six-day programme was a meeting point for over 300 stakeholders from research, practitioner and corporate circles, with proceedings centred around one central topic – \"Research and Robot-Ready Biodiversity Data Standards\". In that sense, the themes of accessibility, responsibility, innovation and collaboration were foremost on the minds of participants as they contemplated how information on the biosphere should be extracted, consolidated and shared in the years to come.
\n\n\n\nAs a long-standing partner of TDWG, Pensoft Publishers served as both a sponsor and an exhibitor for the event. In the latter capacity, the company contributed with a joint booth for three of the EU-funded projects it is leading the outreach efforts for:
\n\n\n\n![\"\"](\"https://i0.wp.com/blog.pensoft.net/wp-content/uploads/2026/09/20260922_081409-1-scaled.jpg?ssl=1\")
A number of other projects from Pensoft's communication portfolio also found a place in the display, including BEAGLE, OneSTOP, B-Cubed, MAMBO, OBSGESSION and BioAgora. Furthermore, 14 of the company's journals were in the spotlight, including Biodiversity Information Science and Standards (BISS), the official journal of the TDWG community (where all of the conference's abstracts are set to be published).
\n\n\n\nCrucially, the event also saw the official launch of ORPHO, Pensoft's new collaborative workspace for scientific writing. Founder and CEO Prof. Lyubomir Penev and CTO Teodor Georgiev conducted live demos of the tool, showcasing how manuscripts crafted within it with full version control for authors become discoverable, interoperable and FAIR-compliant.
\n\n\n\nIn the context of TDWG2026's agenda, they also presented ORPHO's integrated semantic annotation and communication instruments as part of the workshop \"How Literature Services can Support & Benefit from Biodiversity Publication and Data Standards?\" on 24 September. The workspace was received with anticipation and enthusiasm by attendees, with many expressing a desire to test it out for themselves.
\n\n\n\nThey were also treated with a tease of Pensoft's next large-scale endeavour, as Senior Communications Officer Peter Bozakov pulled the curtain behind the forthcoming communication platform for research projects Scientiana.
\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nAs for other notable contributions to the wider conference agenda by researchers affiliated with Pensoft's publishing or project activities:
\n\n\n\n![\"\"](\"https://i0.wp.com/blog.pensoft.net/wp-content/uploads/2026/09/20260921_155043-1-scaled.jpg?ssl=1\")
![\"\"](\"https://i0.wp.com/blog.pensoft.net/wp-content/uploads/2026/09/MVIMG_20260925_094652-1-scaled.jpg?ssl=1\")
Notably, the Biodiversity Information Science and Standards (BISS) journal is the home for TDWG conference abstracts. TDWG 2026 presenters can currently submit their abstracts there and publish them in an extended abstract or mini-paper format completely free of charge. The journal also hosts abstracts from conferences held over the past decade. You can browse the TDWG 2026 collection here.
\n\n\n\nLast but not least, the company's sponsorship supported two awards at TDWG2026 (with a free publication in a Pensoft journal as an accompanying prize):
\n\n\n\n![\"\"](\"https://i0.wp.com/blog.pensoft.net/wp-content/uploads/2026/09/MVIMG_20260925_164100_1-1-scaled.jpg?ssl=1\")
Overall, TDWG2026 proved itself a crucial forum for mapping out the future of biodiversity monitoring and the management of the myriad data streams that emerge from it. Pensoft is proud to be an important actor in this process, contributing with innovative tools and solutions at the heart of the interface between research and practice. As summarised by Prof. Penev:
\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\"Given its status as a large-scale conference centred around the future of biodiversity sciences in the age of AI, TDWG2026 was a crucial venue for unveiling Pensoft's forward-looking vision for academic publishing and science communication. The \"pearl\" of these pursuits is undoubtedly the ORPHO workspace, a tool that is well-placed to introduce a new standard when it comes to collaborative AI-FAIR research in Europe and beyond.\"
\n
***
\n\n\n\nFollow us on Bluesky, Facebook, X, and LinkedIn for future conference updates.
\n\n","doi":"https://doi.org/10.59350/zhfwk-5vr68","guid":"https://blog.pensoft.net/?p=20987","image":"https://blog.pensoft.net/wp-content/uploads/2026/10/SciComm-PR-2026-Instagram-2026-09-28T132928.181.png","language":"en","license":"https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/legalcode","published_at":1790812800,"rid":"w2baa-avn79","summary":"Last week marked another annual meeting of the Biodiversity Information Standards network, otherwise known as TDWG, with the Norwegian capital Oslo hosting the event between 20 and 25 September.","tags":["Advances In Pollinator Research","Agricultural And Environmental Modelling","Biodiversity Data Journal","BISS Journal","Individual-based Ecology"],"title":"Pensoft at TDWG2026: Pushing the boundaries of innovation in biodiversity data management forward","updated_at":1791358243,"url":"https://blog.pensoft.net/2026/10/01/pensoft-at-tdwg2026-pushing-the-boundaries-of-innovation-in-biodiversity-data-management-forward/","version":"v1"}}],"items":[{"authors":[{"contributor_roles":[],"name":"Ko-AutorInnen"}],"blog":{"authors":null,"community_id":"ad6b31bb-31f3-4277-bcf1-7bc662d83893","created":1740441600,"current_feed_url":null,"description":"Netzwerk Fluchtforschung ist ein multi-disziplin\u00e4res Netzwerk von Wissenschaftler*innen die zu jeglichen Aspekten von Flucht und Fl\u00fcchtlingsschutz forschen.","doi":"https://doi.org/10.59350/fluchtforschung","favicon":"https://rogue-scholar.org/api/communities/ad6b31bb-31f3-4277-bcf1-7bc662d83893/logo","feed_format":"application/atom+xml","feed_url":"https://fluchtforschung.net/feed/atom/","filter":null,"generator":"WordPress","home_page_url":"https://fluchtforschung.net/","issn":null,"language":"deu","license":"https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/legalcode","prefix":"10.59350","relative_url":null,"secure":true,"slug":"fluchtforschung","status":"active","subfield":"3312","title":"Netzwerk Fluchtforschung","updated":1791380634,"use_api":true},"blog_name":"Netzwerk Fluchtforschung","blog_slug":"fluchtforschung","content_html":"Das \"GEAS-Anpassungsgesetz\" erm\u00f6glicht es den Bundesl\u00e4ndern, besondere Zentren f\u00fcr diejenigen Schutzsuchenden einzurichten, f\u00fcr deren Asylverfahren m\u00f6glicherweise ein anderer EU-Mitgliedstaat zust\u00e4ndig ist. Bislang haben Sachsen, Sachsen-Anhalt und Hamburg erkl\u00e4rt, entsprechende Zentren einzurichten oder bereits eingerichtet. Der Beitrag zeigt die menschenrechtlichen Risiken auf, die mit den Regelungen zur Ausgestaltung der Zentren verbunden sind: Schutzsuchende k\u00f6nnen unverh\u00e4ltnism\u00e4\u00dfig in ihrer Freiheit beschr\u00e4nkt werden und laufen Gefahr, dass ihre elementaren Grundbed\u00fcrfnisse nicht erf\u00fcllt werden. \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0
\n\n
Die Reform des Gemeinsamen Europ\u00e4ischen Asylsystems (GEAS) wurde auf europ\u00e4ischer Ebene nach jahrelangen Verhandlungen im Mai 2024 beschlossen und ist am 12. Juni 2026 in Kraft getreten. Der Bundestag hat im Februar 2026 ein Gesetz (BT-Drs. 21/1848 und BT-Drs. 21/4321) verabschiedet, um die Reform in das deutsche Recht umzusetzen (Gesetz zur Anpassung des nationalen Rechts an die Reform des Gemeinsamen Europ\u00e4ischen Asylsystems, sog. GEAS-Anpassungsgesetz). Das Gesetz passierte den Bundesrat im M\u00e4rz 2026 ohne Einspruch und ist ebenfalls am 12. Juni 2026 in Kraft getreten. Ein wichtiger Teil des Gesetzes sind die sogenannten \"Aufnahmeeinrichtungen zur Durchf\u00fchrung von Verfahren der Sekund\u00e4rmigration\", oder \"Sekund\u00e4rmigrationszentren\". Dort sollen alle Asylsuchenden untergebracht werden, die zuerst in einen anderen EU-Mitgliedstaat eingereist sind und die sich daher dort aufzuhalten haben (zuvor besser bekannt als sogenannte \"Dublin\"-F\u00e4lle) oder die bereits einen Schutzstatus in einem anderen Mitgliedstaat haben und in Deutschland erneut einen Asylantrag stellen.
\nDie Bundesl\u00e4nder werden gem\u00e4\u00df \u00a7\u00a044 Absatz 1a AsylG erm\u00e4chtigt (aber nicht verpflichtet), solche Zentren einzurichten. Ziel ist es, die Zahl von Dublin-\u00dcberstellungen \"signifikant zu erh\u00f6hen\" (BT-Drs. 21/1848, S. 81). Tats\u00e4chlich ist die Zahl der Dublin-\u00dcberstellungen gering \u2013 jedoch liegt das h\u00e4ufig an mangelnder Kooperation der anderen EU-Mitgliedstaaten, oder Verz\u00f6gerungen bei den Beh\u00f6rden selbst.
\nVorl\u00e4ufer dieser Zentren gibt es bereits jetzt: In Hamburg und Eisenh\u00fcttenstadt wurden noch unter der Ampel-Regierung sogenannte \"Dublin-Zentren\" er\u00f6ffnet, um die Verfahren nach der Verordnung (EU) 604/2013 (sogenannte Dublin-III-Verordnung) und insbesondere R\u00fcck\u00fcberstellungen in den zust\u00e4ndigen Mitgliedstaat zu beschleunigen. Die in Eisenh\u00fcttenstadt untergebrachten Schutzsuchenden kritisierten in einer \u00f6ffentlichen Stellungnahme gravierende Zust\u00e4nde in der Einrichtung.
\nMit Blick auf die Vorgaben des GEAS-Anpassungsgesetzes ergeben sich aus grund-, menschen- und unionsrechtlicher Perspektive auch an den Sekund\u00e4rmigrationszentren Kritikpunkte (siehe auch bereits Fischer-Uebler hier, hier und Deutsches Institut f\u00fcr Menschenrechte hier). Die Kritik betrifft den erschwerten Zugang zu Unterst\u00fctzungsangeboten, die Qualit\u00e4t einzelner Ma\u00dfnahmen als Freiheitsentziehungen, die gesetzliche Vermutung der Fluchtgefahr, mangelnde Ausnahmevorschriften und die fehlerhafte \u00dcbertragung des Begriffs der \"\u00f6ffentlichen Ordnung\" ins nationale Recht.
\n\n
Allein die Verpflichtung, in einer bestimmten Einrichtung zu wohnen, ist \u2013 unabh\u00e4ngig von den dort m\u00f6glichen Freiheitsbeschr\u00e4nkungen (siehe dazu sogleich) \u2013 mit erheblichen Einschr\u00e4nkungen f\u00fcr Schutzsuchende verbunden.
\nDen Personen in den Einrichtungen ist es h\u00e4ufig nicht m\u00f6glich, Bekannte, Freund*innen oder Familienangeh\u00f6rige zu treffen, spezialisierte medizinische Versorgung in Anspruch zu nehmen oder rechtliche Unterst\u00fctzung zu finden. All das geht nur, wenn ihr famili\u00e4res Netzwerk oder die entsprechenden Unterst\u00fctzungsangebote von der Einrichtung aus tats\u00e4chlich erreichbar sind. Das ist insbesondere bei l\u00e4ndlich gelegenen Unterk\u00fcnften aber oftmals nicht der Fall.
\nF\u00fcr besonders vulnerable Schutzsuchende ist die Verpflichtung, in einer bestimmten Einrichtung zu wohnen, noch gravierender. Das gilt beispielsweise f\u00fcr Personen, die von Menschenhandel, von geschlechtsspezifischer oder von h\u00e4uslicher Gewalt betroffen sind. Sie k\u00f6nnen spezielle Schutz- oder Unterst\u00fctzungsangebote oft nicht in Anspruch nehmen \u2013 zum Beispiel, wenn sie Schutz in einer Schutzwohnung oder in einem Frauenhaus suchen m\u00f6chten.
\nF\u00fcr regul\u00e4re Aufnahmeeinrichtungen, die keine Sekund\u00e4rmigrationszentren sind, ist in \u00a7 44 Absatz 2 AsylG ausdr\u00fccklich geregelt, dass geeignete Ma\u00dfnahmen getroffen werden sollen, um die \"besonderen Bed\u00fcrfnisse bei der Aufnahme\" zu identifizieren und zu ber\u00fccksichtigen. Auch der Schutz von Frauen, Kindern und weiteren schutzbed\u00fcrftigen Personen muss gew\u00e4hrleistet werden. Das gilt nach einer m\u00f6glichen Lesart (siehe etwa Deutsches Institut f\u00fcr Menschenrechte) zumindest dem Wortlaut nach f\u00fcr die Sekund\u00e4rmigrationseinrichtungen nicht. Dabei ist Deutschland nach Artikel 24 der Richtlinie 2024/1346 (Aufnahmerichtlinie) auch dort verpflichtet, besondere Bed\u00fcrfnisse bei der Aufnahme zu ber\u00fccksichtigen. Zwar sind Sekund\u00e4rmigrationszentren in der GEAS-Reform weder verpflichtend geregelt noch \u00fcberhaupt vorgesehen \u2013 die Aufnahmerichtlinie differenziert diesbez\u00fcglich nicht. Sie gilt aber immer dann, wenn Mitgliedstaaten die Aufnahme von Asylsuchenden regeln. Hier besteht gesetzlicher Anpassungsbedarf.
\n\n
F\u00fcr Menschen in den Sekund\u00e4rmigrationseinrichtungen und in regul\u00e4ren Aufnahmeeinrichtungen kann bei Fluchtgefahr eine sogenannte Freiheitsbeschr\u00e4nkung angeordnet werden (\u00a7\u00a7 68 Absatz 1, 68a Absatz 1 AsylG). Das bedeutet, dass die Menschen die Einrichtung, in der sie untergebracht sind, dann nicht mehr verlassen d\u00fcrfen. F\u00fcr Menschen im laufenden Verfahren zur Bestimmung des zust\u00e4ndigen Mitgliedstaats bzw. im laufenden Asylverfahren darf die Beschr\u00e4nkung nur nachts (von 22 bis 6 Uhr) angeordnet werden (\u00a7\u00a7 68 Absatz 4 Satz 1, 68a Absatz 4 Satz 5 AsylG); f\u00fcr vollziehbar Ausreisepflichtige auch tags\u00fcber (\u00a7\u00a7\u00a068a Absatz 4 Satz 2, 68a Absatz 4 Satz 5 AsylG).
\nJedenfalls wenn diese Anordnung auch tags\u00fcber gilt, dann handelt es sich um eine Freiheitsentziehung im Sinne von Artikel 2 Absatz 2 Satz 2, 104 GG. Hier l\u00e4sst sich die Rechtsprechung des Bundesverfassungsgerichts zu den Ausgangsbeschr\u00e4nkungen w\u00e4hrend der Covid19-Pandemie heranziehen. Das Gericht hat in der Entscheidung drei Kriterien f\u00fcr die Einordnung einer Ausgangsbeschr\u00e4nkung als Freiheitsentziehung benannt. Erstens: Die Anordnung gilt tags\u00fcber und nicht nur zur Nachtzeit; zweitens: es ist ein fester Ort des Aufenthalts vorgegeben; drittens: es gibt keine oder nur wenige Ausnahmebestimmungen (Rn. 250). Alle diese Kriterien sind hier erf\u00fcllt.
\nKonsequenterweise m\u00fcssen der betroffenen Person dann alle Verfahrensrechte zustehen, die mit einer Inhaftierung einhergehen. Insbesondere darf die Anordnung gem\u00e4\u00df Artikel 104 Absatz 2 GG nur von einer Richterin oder einem Richter getroffen werden \u2013 das hat das Bundesverfassungsgericht im Jahr 2025 noch einmal betont. Ein solcher Richter*innenvorbehalt ist im Gesetz allerdings nicht vorgesehen.
\n\n
Sowohl in regul\u00e4ren Aufnahmeeinrichtungen als auch in Sekund\u00e4rmigrationseinrichtungen ist eine wichtige Voraussetzung f\u00fcr die Anordnung einer Freiheitsbeschr\u00e4nkung, dass Fluchtgefahr besteht (\u00a7\u00a7 68 Absatz 1, 68a Absatz 1 AsylG). Der Unterschied zu regul\u00e4ren Aufnahmeeinrichtungen ist aber: bei Menschen in Sekund\u00e4rmigrationseinrichtungen wird diese Fluchtgefahr vermutet und muss dann von den Betroffenen im Einzelfall widerlegt werden (\u00a7 68 Absatz 2 Satz 1 AsylG). Die Anordnung einer Freiheitsbeschr\u00e4nkung wird dadurch erheblich erleichtert.
\nBei der Freiheitsbeschr\u00e4nkung handelt es sich um einen empfindlichen Eingriff in die Grundrechte der betroffenen Personen. Das gilt unabh\u00e4ngig davon, ob oder in welchen Fallkonstellationen es sich um eine Freiheitsbeschr\u00e4nkung oder gar eine Freiheitsentziehung handelt. In jedem Fall m\u00fcssen sowohl die gesetzliche Erm\u00e4chtigung als auch die Anordnung im Einzelfall einer strengen Verh\u00e4ltnism\u00e4\u00dfigkeitspr\u00fcfung gen\u00fcgen.
\nDem wird die widerlegliche Vermutung der Fluchtgefahr nicht gerecht. Die gesetzliche Vermutung greift, ohne dass tats\u00e4chlich Anhaltspunkte im Einzelfall bestehen m\u00fcssen, dass sich die Person dem Verfahren entziehen will. Allein aufgrund der Tatsache, dass sich die Person im Verfahren zur Bestimmung des zust\u00e4ndigen Mitgliedstaats befindet, besteht die Gefahr der Freiheitsbeschr\u00e4nkung, ohne dass die Person etwas dagegen tun kann.
\nAu\u00dferdem ist die H\u00fcrde, die Fluchtgefahr zu widerlegen, unverh\u00e4ltnism\u00e4\u00dfig hoch. Denn die betroffenen Personen m\u00fcssen nachweisen, dass aufgrund ihrer pers\u00f6nlichen Verh\u00e4ltnisse und sozialen Bindungen in der Bundesrepublik ausgeschlossen ist, dass sie sich dem Verfahren entziehen werden (\u00a7 68 Absatz 2 Satz 2 AsylG). Personen, die verpflichtet sind, in Sekund\u00e4rmigrationseinrichtungen zu wohnen, wird es sehr schwerfallen, soziale Bindungen in Deutschland aufzubauen. Das gilt umso mehr, wenn sie die Einrichtung nicht verlassen d\u00fcrfen. Au\u00dferdem wird es kaum jemandem jemals gelingen, nachzuweisen, dass eine Flucht vollst\u00e4ndig ausgeschlossen ist \u2013 selbst wenn die Personen keinerlei Absichten dazu hat.
\nDar\u00fcber hinaus ist die Vermutung der Fluchtgefahr nicht von der Aufnahmerichtlinie gedeckt.
\nDie Fluchtgefahr ist nach der Aufnahmerichtlinie ein wichtiges Kriterium daf\u00fcr, die Freiheitsbeschr\u00e4nkung anordnen zu k\u00f6nnen. Dieses Kriterium wird ausgeh\u00f6hlt, wenn die Fluchtgefahr durch gesetzliche Anordnung allen Menschen in Sekund\u00e4rmigrationszentren unterstellt wird. Fluchtgefahr wird au\u00dferdem definiert als \"im Einzelfall vorliegende besondere Gr\u00fcnde und Umst\u00e4nde, die die auf objektiven, im nationalen Recht festgelegten Kriterien beruhen und zu der Annahme Anlass geben, dass ein Antragsteller fliehen k\u00f6nnte\" (Artikel 2 Nr. 11 Aufnahmerichtlinie, zu diesem Argument ausf\u00fchrlich bereits Eckert). Richtig ist zwar, dass die Aufnahmerichtlinie Menschen im Verfahren zur Bestimmung des zust\u00e4ndigen Mitgliedstaats als potentielle Fallgruppe f\u00fcr die Freiheitsbeschr\u00e4nkung in den Blick nimmt. Das entbindet aber nicht davon, Fluchtgefahr im Einzelfall zu begr\u00fcnden.
\n\n
Die Regelungen zu den Freiheitsbeschr\u00e4nkungen im aktuellen Gesetzentwurf sehen keine ausreichenden Ausnahmevorschriften vor. Gesetzliche Ausnahmen von der Freiheitsbeschr\u00e4nkung gelten nur f\u00fcr Termine bei Beh\u00f6rden und Gerichten und f\u00fcr den Regelschulbesuch Minderj\u00e4hriger (\u00a7\u00a7 68 Absatz 5 Satz 6, 68 Absatz 2 Satz 5 AsylG). Diese Ausnahmen sind aus menschenrechtlicher Perspektive zu eng. So sind beispielsweise Besuche bei \u00c4rzt*innen oder Anw\u00e4lt*innen oder anderen Beratungsstellen nicht schon von der gesetzlichen Ausnahme erfasst. F\u00fcr die Behandlung akuter Erkrankungen \"soll\" die zust\u00e4ndige Beh\u00f6rde eine Einzelfallerlaubnis zum Verlassen der Einrichtung erteilen (\u00a7\u00a068 Absatz 5 Satz 4 AsylG). Die Behandlung chronischer Leiden ist hiervon indes nicht erfasst. Das ist mit Blick auf das Recht auf Gesundheit problematisch (z.B. verankert in Artikel 12 UN-Sozialpakt); der Besuch bei Anw\u00e4lt*innen ist f\u00fcr den Zugang zu Rechtsschutz (siehe Rudolf, Menschenrecht auf Zugang zum Recht) unerl\u00e4sslich.
\nAu\u00dferdem sind Mitgliedstaaten nach der Aufnahmerichtlinie dazu verpflichtet, besondere Bed\u00fcrfnisse bei der Aufnahme zu ber\u00fccksichtigen (Artikel 24 Aufnahmerichtlinie). Wenn Menschen solche besonderen Bed\u00fcrfnisse bei der Aufnahme haben, weil sie etwa eine schwere (chronische) Erkrankung oder Behinderungen haben oder Opfer schwerster Gewalt geworden sind, k\u00f6nnen sie unter Umst\u00e4nden ihre Einrichtung nicht verlassen, um zum Arzt zu gehen, psychologische Betreuung zu erhalten oder spezielle Unterst\u00fctzungs- oder Beratungsangebote wahrzunehmen.
\nM\u00f6glicherweise k\u00f6nnen sie f\u00fcr diese Zwecke nicht einmal eine Erlaubnis im Einzelfall erhalten. Denn eine Verlassenserlaubnis im Einzelfall darf \u2013 mit Ausnahme zur Behandlung akuter Erkrankungen oder auch f\u00fcr berufliche Zwecke \u2013 f\u00fcr vollziehbar ausreisepflichtige Personen in Sekund\u00e4rmigrationseinrichtungen nur zur Wahrnehmung einer \"zwingend gebotenen sittlichen Verpflichtung\" erteilt werden (\u00a7 68 Absatz 5 Satz 5 AsylG).
\nDie Gesetzesbegr\u00fcndung liefert keine Anhaltspunkte daf\u00fcr, welche Umst\u00e4nde eine solche \"zwingend gebotene sittliche Verpflichtung\" begr\u00fcnden. Hier besteht aus menschenrechtlicher Perspektive die Gefahr einer restriktiven Auslegung. Gerade durch die Begrenzung auf \"sittliche Verpflichtungen\" kommen andere, unter Umst\u00e4nden zwingend oder auch nur dringend gebotenen Bed\u00fcrfnisse zu kurz. So k\u00f6nnten der Gang zur Apotheke oder Termine mit Anw\u00e4lt*innen gegebenenfalls als nicht zwingend geboten eingestuft werden, sodass die betroffenen Personen keine M\u00f6glichkeit h\u00e4tten, entsprechende Versorgung in Anspruch zu nehmen.
\n\n
Die Freiheitsbeschr\u00e4nkung kann nach dem GEAS-Anpassungsgesetz aus Gr\u00fcnden der \"\u00f6ffentlichen Ordnung\" angeordnet werden. Das Gesetz geht hier ausdr\u00fccklich vom nationalen Begriff der \u00f6ffentlichen Ordnung aus (BT-Drs. 21/1848, S. 116). Dadurch verst\u00f6\u00dft das Gesetz gegen das Unionsrecht. Zwar spricht auch die Aufnahmerichtlinie von der \"\u00f6ffentlichen Ordnung\" als Voraussetzung f\u00fcr die Anordnung einer Freiheitsbeschr\u00e4nkung (Artikel 9 Absatz 1 Aufnahmerichtlinie). Der Begriff der \u00f6ffentlichen Ordnung im Unionsrecht ist aber deutlich enger gefasst.
\nEin Versto\u00df gegen die \u00f6ffentliche Ordnung im Unionsrecht erfordert, \"dass au\u00dfer der sozialen St\u00f6rung, die jeder Gesetzesversto\u00df darstellt, eine tats\u00e4chliche, gegenw\u00e4rtige und hinreichend erhebliche Gefahr vorliegt, die ein Grundinteresse der Gesellschaft ber\u00fchrt\" (siehe etwa EuGH 2015, Rn. 79).
\nDemgegen\u00fcber bezeichnet der nationale Begriff der \u00f6ffentlichen Ordnung die \"Gesamtheit der ungeschriebenen Regeln [\u2026], deren Befolgung nach den jeweils herrschenden sozialen und ethischen Anschauungen als unerl\u00e4ssliche Voraussetzung eines geordneten menschlichen Zusammenlebens innerhalb eines bestimmten Gebiets angesehen wird\" (siehe etwa BVerfG\u00a01985, Rn. 78). Er erfasst nur Verhaltensweisen, die keine geschriebene Rechtsnorm verletzen, da diese bereits im Begriff der \u00f6ffentlichen Sicherheit enthalten sind. Als Grundlage f\u00fcr eine Freiheitsbeschr\u00e4nkung ist er damit zu unscharf und nicht von der Aufnahmerichtlinie gedeckt.
\n\n
Die Sekund\u00e4rmigrationszentren, wie sie im GEAS-Anpassungsgesetz vorgesehen sind, sind aus grund-, menschen- und unionsrechtlicher Perspektive abzulehnen. Schon die Unterbringung in Zentren birgt menschenrechtliche Risiken. Umso schwerer wiegen die weitreichenden M\u00f6glichkeiten, gegen\u00fcber den in den Zentren untergebrachten Personen Bewegungsbeschr\u00e4nkungen anzuordnen. Diese bewirken erhebliche Eingriffe in die Freiheit von Schutzsuchenden. Hinzu kommt, dass das Recht auf Gesundheit, der Zugang zu Rechtsberatung und der Schutz von Personen mit besonderen Vulnerabilit\u00e4ten nicht ausreichend gew\u00e4hrleistet werden. Die L\u00e4nder sollten daher von ihrer Erm\u00e4chtigung, solche Zentren einzurichten, keinen Gebrauch machen.
","doi":"https://doi.org/10.59350/w1ghw-50251","guid":"https://fluchtforschung.net/?p=15983","language":"de","license":"https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/legalcode","published_at":1791331200,"rid":"88yme-7y691","summary":"Das \"GEAS-Anpassungsgesetz\" erm\u00f6glicht es den Bundesl\u00e4ndern, besondere Zentren f\u00fcr diejenigen Schutzsuchenden einzurichten, f\u00fcr deren Asylverfahren m\u00f6glicherweise ein anderer EU-Mitgliedstaat zust\u00e4ndig ist. Bislang haben Sachsen, Sachsen-Anhalt und Hamburg erkl\u00e4rt, entsprechende Zentren einzurichten oder bereits eingerichtet.","tags":["Deutsch","Forschung","EU","GEAS","Gemeinsamen Europ\u00e4ischen Asylsystems (GEAS)"],"title":"Menschenrechte in den neuen \"Dublin-Zentren\"?","updated_at":1791380709,"url":"https://fluchtforschung.net/menschenrechte-in-den-neuen-dublin-zentren/","version":"v1"},{"authors":[{"affiliation":[{"id":"https://ror.org/02jz4aj89","name":"Maastricht University"}],"contributor_roles":[],"family":"Willighagen","given":"Egon","url":"https://orcid.org/0000-0001-7542-0286"}],"blog":{"authors":[{"name":"Egon Willighagen"}],"community_id":"7f57028e-9d03-489c-b3b4-3d60de06bc9e","created":1710288000,"current_feed_url":"https://chem-bla-ics.linkedchemistry.info/feed.json","description":"Chemblaics (pronounced chem-bla-ics) is the science that uses open science and computers to solve problems in chemistry, biochemistry and related fields.","doi":"https://doi.org/10.59350/chem_bla_ics","favicon":"https://rogue-scholar.org/api/communities/7f57028e-9d03-489c-b3b4-3d60de06bc9e/logo","feed_format":"application/feed+json","feed_url":"https://chem-bla-ics.linkedchemistry.info/archive.json","filter":null,"generator":"Jekyll","home_page_url":"https://chem-bla-ics.linkedchemistry.info","issn":null,"language":"eng","license":"https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/legalcode","prefix":"10.59350","relative_url":null,"secure":true,"slug":"chem_bla_ics","status":"active","subfield":"1606","title":"chem-bla-ics","updated":1791331200,"use_api":true},"blog_name":"chem-bla-ics","blog_slug":"chem_bla_ics","content_html":"Okay, the Pilot\nis over ending with 17 papers, 16 of which have CiTO\nannotations (and so far 4 J.Cheminform. papers\nafter the\npilot), but my interest in the\nCitation Typing Ontology continues and we just need\nmore adoption.
\nDatasets as source of annotations
\nSo, here's a quick Wikidata update. I have been using Wikidata as infrastructure to collect and share CiTO\nannotations (see also the below \"Scholia patch\" posts). Some time ago I recovered my CiteULike CiTO annotations and made this\navailable on Zenodo (doi:10.5281/zenodo.7368209).
\nAnd while thinking about datasets with CiTO annotations, I found two other datasets. One was from an article in Portuguese and one from an\narticle by Peroni et al. with\nthis data file. That data file is actually a zip, but inside the zip file is a CSV file with three\ninteresting columns: cited_doi, citing_doi, and intext_citation.intent. There are many more columns and I can highly recommend browsing\nthem. But these are the three I need to add data to Wikidata. The third column is free text, but using the CiTO for labels, making it\nrelatively easy to convert to citation intentions from Wikidata\n(PS, thanks to Fvtvr3r for adding more!).
So, I had a cleaned file and started writing a Groovy Bioclipse script using Bacting.\nIt basically does a few things: extract all DOIs, check which ones are in Wikidata, analyze the intext_citation.intent column content,\nand then generate QuickStatements (see this gist). Out of the 600\nlines from the input, it creates some 200 new CiTO-annotated citations in Wikidata between\nsome 150 article pairs:
The ability to include CiTO annotations from datasets is another welcome boost for the CiTO statistics in Wikidata.\nThis SPARQL query shows an overview of sources that support the CiTO intention annotation, but note that\na claim with a CiTO intention may also have CrossRef, PubMed, and COCI as reference. In those cases, they are primarily for\nthe citations and not the intention.
\nThere are now (the latest stats are here)\n1202 citation intention annotations in Wikidata for 992 citations from 405 articles in 199 venues. Of these 27 articles have\nexplicit annotations in the article itself and are found in 4 venues, two journals and two preprint servers). These annotated citations\nare to 510 articles in 190 different venues. This Scholia patch will add a new\nstatistics, the number of datasets providing citation intentions, of which there are (as discussed)\ncurrently two in Wikidata.\nThe latter two provide intentions for the majority of articles and are depicted in yellow in the below overview.
\n
With an annotation in an 1938 article by Alan Turing! I ran into this article in November 2011\nnoting an apparent duplicate title in his article list. I turned out an earlier article had a correction with the same name.\nI added this clarification:
\n
This is very trivial citation intention data that publishers could provide as open data.
\nOkay, that will do for today. There are actually some really interesting things in the pipeline, but I will have to write about that later. I have some deadlines I should start looking at. Below is some extra reading.\nSome more history
\nOn 15-17 September 2026, members of the Bioconductor, Galaxy and nf-core communities came together at The Open University in Milton Keynes for the BioFAIR Data to Discovery and BioFAIR Collaboration Fest (CoFest) joint event.
\nThe three-day event combined hands-on training with collaborative work on research software interoperability. It was jointly organised by BioFAIR Fellow Marisa Loach and BioFAIR Pathfinder project lead and Institute for Research Software 2026 Fellow Kevin Rue-Albrecht.
\nThe CoFest brought together contributors based in the UK, Ireland, Germany, India and the USA, with both in-person and remote participation.
\nMarisa led the Data to Discovery training, introducing participants to single-cell analysis using the European instance of the Galaxy platform (https://usegalaxy.eu/), while Kevin led the hybrid CoFest focused on making methods developed as Bioconductor R packages more readily accessible through infrastructures such as Galaxy and nf-core.
\nA Galaxy community recap of the event also covers the training and CoFest from the Galaxy perspective.
\nThere are numerous communities in the bioinformatics space focusing on different aspects like code development, making non-code GUIs, creating tutorials and documentation, and more. Some of these are Bioconductor, Galaxy and nf-core, which play complementary roles in bioinformatics. Bioconductor provides a large ecosystem of R packages implementing analysis methods; Galaxy provides an accessible environment for running and sharing reproducible analyses; and nf-core provides a community framework for portable Nextflow pipelines.
\nThe challenge is that making the same method available across these environments often requires separate wrappers, metadata and maintenance. The BioFAIR Pathfinder project behind the event is exploring ways to reduce that duplication, including tooling for adapting Bioconductor methods as Galaxy tools and nf-core modules.
\nA major focus of the CoFest was BiocJobs, an approach being developed that allows analysis tasks to be described alongside Bioconductor packages and used to generate representations for different workflow systems.
\nRather than only discussing interoperability, participants applied this approach to an exemplar single-cell analysis workflow.
\nThe group mapped parts of that workflow to reusable package-level 'BiocJobs' and tested the path from descriptions maintained alongside Bioconductor packages to generated workflow components. Work covered steps including data import, quality control, normalisation, dimensionality reduction and marker analysis.
\nThis gave contributors a concrete way to test the process, improve documentation, and identify what would be needed to make it easier for others to contribute.
\n
On the final day, we captured the workflow we had been working towards in a single diagram: from a commit to a Bioconductor package repository, through the automatic building and publishing of tool wrappers, to their use in Galaxy, nf-core and other workflow environments.
\n
Three days were not enough to fully implement the workflow captured in the diagram - nor was that the goal. Instead, the CoFest demonstrated the process on a small number of selected workflow steps, while documenting how others could contribute. This created a foundation for onboarding new contributors and, over time, enabling more contributors to create wrappers for other widely used Bioconductor methods.
\nOne of the clearest lessons was that interoperability is not just about writing software that connects one platform to another.
\nIt also depends on deciding where information should live, who is best placed to maintain it, and how contributions can fit naturally into the practices of each community. Bringing Bioconductor package developers, Galaxy contributors, and nf-core developers into the same room made it possible to look at the process end to end rather than from the perspective of a single ecosystem.
\nThe event also reinforced the value of working from a concrete scientific use case. Using a real single-cell workflow gave participants something shared to build, test and discuss, while exposing questions that would have been difficult to anticipate from design discussions alone. The CoFest notes capture several of those emerging questions, particularly around how reusable jobs should be structured and composed.
\nThe CoFest was intended as a starting point rather than a one-off sprint.
\nThe immediate next step is to continue refining the workflow demonstrated during the event: improving the tooling and documentation, testing it on additional Bioconductor methods, and making it easier for new contributors to take part.
\nWe are also planning follow-up events in the first quarter of 2027. These will provide an opportunity to bring the communities together again, build on the examples developed in Milton Keynes and involve more contributors in extending the approach to other widely used methods.
\nThe longer-term aim is simple: make it easier for software developed in one research community to become useful, sustainable building blocks in another.
\nInterested in getting involved? Join the Bioconductor Zulip and the #biofair2026-workflow-sprint channel and follow the BiocJobs topic for ongoing discussion.
\n\n\u00a9 2026 Bioconductor. Content is published under Creative Commons CC-BY-4.0 License for the text and BSD 3-Clause License for any code. | R-Bloggers\n
","doi":"https://doi.org/10.59350/0h4ec-srk87","guid":"https://blog.bioconductor.org/posts/2026-10-07-biofair-cofest/","image":"https://blog.bioconductor.org/posts/2026-10-07-biofair-cofest/biocjobs-workflow.jpg","language":"en","license":"https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/legalcode","published_at":1791331200,"rid":"6bxj1-6dg44","summary":"On 15-17 September 2026, members of the Bioconductor, Galaxy and nf-core communities came together at The Open University in Milton Keynes for the BioFAIR Data to Discovery and BioFAIR Collaboration Fest (CoFest) joint event. The three-day event combined hands-on training with collaborative work on research software interoperability.","tags":["Bioconductor","FAIR","Hackathon","Galaxy","Nf-core"],"title":"A Collaboration Fest for research software interoperability","updated_at":1791365704,"url":"https://blog.bioconductor.org/posts/2026-10-07-biofair-cofest/","version":"v1"},{"authors":[{"contributor_roles":[],"family":"Eden","given":"Terence"}],"content_html":"Recently, my blog was featured on Coil's list of monetised content. I'd like to take a little time to explain what Web Monetisation is, how to get set up with it, and what my thoughts are.
\n\nStick this line in the <head> of your HTML page.
![\"Lepidosira](\"https://i0.wp.com/blog.pensoft.net/wp-content/uploads/2026/06/oo_1569979-1.jpg?resize=840%2C499\")
![\"Lepidosira](\"https://i0.wp.com/blog.pensoft.net/wp-content/uploads/2026/06/oo_1569985-1.jpg?resize=840%2C1031\")
![\"Lepidosira](\"https://i0.wp.com/blog.pensoft.net/wp-content/uploads/2026/06/oo_1569991.jpg?resize=840%2C607\")
![\"\"](\"https://i0.wp.com/blog.pensoft.net/wp-content/uploads/2026/09/MVIMG_20260924_110656-1-scaled.jpg?resize=840%2C630\")
![\"\"](\"https://i0.wp.com/blog.pensoft.net/wp-content/uploads/2026/09/MVIMG_20260924_110811-scaled.jpg?resize=840%2C630\")
<meta name=\"monetization\" content=\"$ilp.uphold.com/ieELEKD7epqw\">\nThat's it.
\n\nYou should replace my uphold address with your own. Unless you want me to get paid for your work.
\n\nThis is a draft specification for seamless payments on the web.
\n\nThis gives a website visitor a few ways to pay to use a website.
\n\nThere's a lot more to it than that - obviously - but that'll do as a brief explanation.
\n\nI was asked to beta test Coil - so that's what this section will focus on.
\n\nThey have a pretty simple guide to getting started. In theory, you can choose a variety of payment providers. I went with Uphold because they don't require you to use a shitty pseudo-currency based on half-baked Blockchain tech. You can get your money in pounds, pesos, pa\u02bbanga, or most other world currencies.
\n\nUphold, like any reputable financial institution, has to perform a Know Your Customer check. The usual thing of sending in copies of your ID and proving you are who you claim. Nothing too arduous.
\n\nOnce you have an \"Interledger Payments\" address - $ilp.uphold.com/ieELEKD7epqw - you can use it to start receiving payments from visitors.
Coil has a range of plugins for things like WordPress, and can even connect your YouTube and Twitch accounts to enable monetisation there.
\n\nWe need a better way to pay for the web - because advertising sucks. At best it is boorish and irrelevant interruptions. At worst it is... well, look around you.
\n\nUnfortunately, as popular as my blog is, I quite often get notifications like this:
\n\n\n\nI know every penny helps - but that's a bit ridiculous!
\n\nIt's a chicken-and-egg problem. But I think it's important that content creators take the first step. Start putting the meta elements on your pages now. Get the content and infrastructure there, and wait for consumers to catch up.
\n\nCoil could do with a bit more fine grained detail on where payments are coming from. It would be useful for me to know which of my pages performs best, or whether payments have come from YouTube or Twitch. But it is early days - I'm excited to see how it develops.
\n\nSo, get started now with Web Monetisation - and perhaps we can rid the web of the scourge of advertising.
","doi":"https://doi.org/10.59350/egs7p-7g234","guid":"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/?p=36865","image":"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/wp-content/uploads/2020/01/Storm-Trooper-Chocolate-Money.jpg","language":"en","license":"https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/legalcode","published_at":1602028800,"rid":"83yzt-4xx94","summary":"Recently, my blog was featured on Coil's list of monetised content. I'd like to take a little time to explain what Web Monetisation is, how to get set up with it, and what my thoughts are. Quickstart Stick this line in the of your HTML page. That's it. You should replace my uphold address with your own.","tags":["/etc/","HTML5","Money","Web"],"title":"Adding Web Monetization to your site using Coil","updated_at":1791363250,"url":"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2020/10/adding-web-monetization-to-your-site-using-coil/","version":"v1"},{"authors":[{"contributor_roles":[],"family":"Eden","given":"Terence"}],"content_html":"I'm an idiot. I ran a new version of Firefox nightly without creating a new profile. When I went to run my regular Firefox, I got this error message:
\n\n\n\nHere's how I fixed it.
\n\nfirefox --allow-downgradeabout:profilesfirefox --allow-downgradeThat should do it! Next time you start Firefox normally, everything should be fine. Probably.
\n\nIn the future, make backups of your $HOME directory, and create a new profile for your Nightlies!
","doi":"https://doi.org/10.59350/cd0qg-f3y50","guid":"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/?p=40549","image":"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/wp-content/uploads/2021/10/Screenshot-from-2021-10-04-21-32-37.png","language":"en","license":"https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/legalcode","published_at":1633564800,"rid":"ftcv1-wbh67","summary":"I'm an idiot. I ran a new version of Firefox nightly without creating a new profile. When I went to run my regular Firefox, I got this error message: Here's how I fixed it. Close down Firefox Open a terminal and run: firefox --allow-downgrade Let Firefox start up and create a new profile.","tags":["/etc/","Firefox","Linux","Ubuntu"],"title":"How to fix an upgraded Firefox profile","updated_at":1791363249,"url":"https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2021/10/how-to-fix-an-upgraded-firefox-profile/","version":"v1"},{"authors":[{"contributor_roles":[],"family":"Jehn","given":"Florian Ulrich","url":"https://orcid.org/0000-0002-7296-8008"}],"blog":{"authors":null,"community_id":"86cf2e28-4644-41b0-9d6d-66444a612b18","created":1751500800,"current_feed_url":null,"description":"Thoughts about existential risk, history, climate, food security and societal collapse.","doi":"https://doi.org/10.59350/existentialcrunch","favicon":"https://rogue-scholar.org/api/communities/86cf2e28-4644-41b0-9d6d-66444a612b18/logo","feed_format":"application/rss+xml","feed_url":"https://existentialcrunch.substack.com/feed","filter":null,"generator":"Substack","home_page_url":"https://existentialcrunch.substack.com","issn":null,"language":"eng","license":"https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/legalcode","prefix":"10.59350","relative_url":null,"secure":true,"slug":"existentialcrunch","status":"active","subfield":"2306","title":"Existential Crunch","updated":1791360938,"use_api":true},"blog_name":"Existential Crunch","blog_slug":"existentialcrunch","content_html":"Time for updates again! Besides new references, there's also something else I wanted to share. I had the great opportunity to publish in the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists. In the article, I give an overview of how nuclear war would impact the global food system. Might be an interesting read if you subscribe to this blog here.
I would also be interested in your thoughts. Blogging can sometimes feel a bit one sided. So, if this blog here has been helpful for you, I would love to hear about it in the comments! Also, let me know if you have ideas how this could be more useful for you.
And now the actual updates:
One big factor that has come up in many of the papers I have been reading for this blog is inequality. It is just generally corrosive to societies if it gets too high. A recent preprint by myself and Dan Hoyer extends this argument to say that high inequality is also an important contributor to global catastrophic risk.
This argument of showing that inequality is relevant to global catastrophic risk has been made more extensively by Jehn & Hoyer (2026). This study is a review that makes the argument that inequality and global catastrophic risk are rising at the same time and that these two trends are not disconnected. The argument is mostly based on historical findings that inequality has corrosive effects on both state capacity and social cohesion, but that those two properties are essential to allow societies to react to large catastrophes. These examples come from both deeper history, as well as more recent research around how modern democracies handle natural hazards. In both cases those societies with lower inequality tend to fare better. Also, democracies seem to be the form of government that invests most in prevention of global catastrophes, as shown by national risk registers. This also means that reducing inequality is important from a second angle: democracies are best when it comes to global catastrophic risk, but they are also especially vulnerable to high inequality, as this undermines democratic legitimacy.
If people feel left behind in their own countries, this increases the chance of leaders getting elected who promise to restore order and blame problems on outsiders. Such leaders likely turn towards protectionism and away from multilateral institutions. This matters because global catastrophe is often connected to coordination problems, especially between countries. An example of this would be global food trade, which could be easily disrupted by countries introducing export bans. So the same inequality that makes a society less able to cope internally also makes it worse at the kind of cooperation that catastrophes demand.
These kinds of processes could introduce a dangerous loop against global resilience. Inequality weakens democratic functioning, weak democracies produce leaders who do not address inequality because the resentment is useful to them, those leaders undermine international cooperation, and the crises that follow do not reduce inequality either. This is more speculative than the historical findings above, but if it holds, reducing inequality is possibly a prerequisite to enable the international collaboration that is needed to be safe from global catastrophic risk.
When we look into history, climate often comes up as an important factor that shapes the fate of societies. Climate in turn can be greatly impacted by volcanic eruptions. I added three papers to the post that look deeper into the consequences of large eruptions.
The research group around Ulf B\u00fcngten also did a follow up review to this study a few years later (B\u00fcntgen et al., 2025). This one is an extensive review and not original research. What they find in the literature is that roughly every 50 years there is an eruption that is big enough to impact climate on a level which is meaningful for human societies. Though, there can also be much more intensive eruptive episodes. For example, the period 1783 to 1835 had five significant eruptions. For most of these eruptions the climate is strongly influenced for around three years, but takes around two decades to get completely back to pre-eruption baselines. Also, the behavior can differ between global and local scales. Even smaller eruptions can potentially have strong local climate impacts, while globally there is not much difference. The impact can also change by season. Generally, there is way less research about temperature impacts in winter, because most of the climate data following eruptions is from tree rings, which do not grow in winter anyway. Additionally, there are still climate impacts in the historical record, which we cannot attribute to any specific volcano, showing how little we actually know.
In addition to these broad studies, we can also look at specific volcanic impacts. One example here comes from Kaniewski et al. (2025). They looked at the Little Ice Age (~1250 to ~1860) in particular and mapped all the rebellions and revolutions that happened during that time period. What they find is that climate is an important stressor. Their key results are:
In times of declining solar activity (when it gets colder) we find more rebellions and revolutions.
The drier and colder a period is, the more rebellions and revolutions there are.
Rebellions and revolutions are usually preceded by rising grain prices.
However, what they also find is that often societies can come through dry and cold periods mostly unharmed if they react properly. Their go to example is England, which managed to make it through many rough periods without rebellions and revolutions, because it was able to suck in additional resources through its empire.
Even more into detail goes Huhtamaa et al. (2022). Their argument is that if you want to understand volcanic impacts, it makes much more sense to look at how the same society reacted to different volcanic eruptions. They pick Finland to study this and find that generally, the more destabilized your society is when the volcano erupts, the stronger the impact will be. To study this they looked at temperature data and grain harvest fluctuations to assess the climate and food system impacts and at how many farms get deserted as a proxy for how well the society is in general. Using this, they look at the impacts of three separate volcanic eruptions that had a similar atmospheric impact. They find for all three eruptions that temperatures go down and yields decline, but that the desertion rate of farms differ. For one of the eruptions the society was already quite stressed due to war and we see a spike in desertion rates. However, in a later eruption, the state introduced extensive agroeconomic relief measures and the desertion rate stayed lower. Though, even with these measures, the impacts were significant, especially for the poorer parts of society.
One important argument I am trying to make on this blog here, is that democracies are likely more resilient to all kinds of hazards than non-democratic societies. Switzerland especially seems to be pretty good in planning ahead. I added a short mention of a report that analyzed the Swiss food system:
Switzerland seems to have a pretty good risk assessment in comparison to many other countries. In addition to the extensive national risk assessment, they have also invested in building a model of the Swiss food system (Zimmermann et al., 2017). This model is used to assess how the Swiss population could be fed in a variety of catastrophes and finds that they likely could feed their population in a lot of scenarios, but that this would mean strong changes in dietary habits.
Thank you for your interest in this academic experiment. Here's a great song as an appreciation.
If this post (or others here) got you thinking, consider leaving a like. It helps more people stumble onto this blog.
As you made it this deep, I assume that you like the stuff that is written here. If you want to do me a little favor, I would really appreciate it if you could share your favorite post with someone who might enjoy it.
Go ahead, you can do it right now. Nothing more to read in this post anyway.
Much appreciated!
Thanks for reading! If you want to talk about this post or societal collapse in general, I'd be happy to have a chat. Just send me an email to existential_crunch at posteo.de and we can schedule something.
B\u00fcntgen, U., Cosmo, N. D., Esper, J., Frachetti, M., Khalidi, L., Mauelshagen, F., Rohland, E., & Oppenheimer, C. (2025). Volcanoes, Climate, and Society. https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev-earth-032524-013254
Huhtamaa, H., Stoffel, M., & Corona, C. (2022). Recession or resilience? Long-range socioeconomic consequences of the 17th century volcanic eruptions in northern Fennoscandia. Climate of the Past, 18(9), 2077\u20132092. https://doi.org/10.5194/cp-18-2077-2022
Jehn, F. U., & Hoyer, D. (2026). Inequality's contribution to global catastrophic risk. EarthArXiv. https://eartharxiv.org/repository/view/12164/
Kaniewski, D., Marriner, N., Luce, F., Escarpe, M., Pourkerman, M., & Otto, T. (2025). A climate of conflict: How the little ice age sparked rebellions and revolutions across Europe. Global and Planetary Change, 254, 105038. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.gloplacha.2025.105038
Zimmermann, A., Ferjani, A., Mann, S., Haudenschild, U., Mittelholzer, M., & M\u00fcller, P. (2017). Ern\u00e4hrungspotenzial der landwirtschaftlichen Kulturfl\u00e4chen: Analyse einer optimierten Inlandproduktion von Nahrungsmitteln im Fall von schweren Mangellagen. Bundesamt f\u00fcr wirtschaftliche Landesversorgung (BWL).
High on the Qinghai-Xizang Plateau, often called the \"Roof of the World,\" a new species of snake waits beneath the stones…
\n\n\n\nScientists from Yibin University and collaborating institutions have formally described Indotyphlops gyirongensis, the Gyirong blind snake, a discovery that adds a new member to one of the least understood branches of the snake family tree.
\n\n\n\nBlind snakes are small, burrowing reptiles that spend nearly their entire lives underground. Their secretive habits and similar appearances make them notoriously difficult to study.
\n\n\n\nThe family Typhlopidae contains roughly 280 species, yet its relationships remain poorly resolved, and new species continue to surface wherever researchers look carefully. Until now, no blind snake had ever been recorded in the Xizang Autonomous Region, which makes this find a first for the area.
\n\n\n\nThe single specimen, an adult female, was collected in August 2025 at an elevation of 2,262 metres, close to the border between China and Nepal. She was resting beneath a stone at the edge of an evergreen broad-leaved forest, where deep humus and a thick layer of fallen leaves create ideal conditions for a creature that lives by burrowing. Among her neighbours were a Himalayan pit viper and a Himalayan toad!
\n\n\n\nThe snake itself is slender and elegant. At 265 millimetres, it is large by the standards of its genus, yet it measures just 3.5 millimetres across at midbody. Its glossy scales are light brown, each one darker on its rear half, which gives the body a delicate and finely patterned sheen. The underside is cream and so thin-skinned that it is partly transparent to the internal organs.
\n\n\n\nMost distinctive is its pale cream head cap, which lacks pigment as far back as the eye. The eye itself is only a dark spot, with no visible pupil or iris, fitting for an animal that navigates by touch and chemical cues rather than sight. Its tail ends in a small nubbin rather than a sharp spine.
\n\n\n\nSome of the most telling differences are hidden in the arrangement of the scales along the lip. Blind snakes are classified partly by how their upper lip scales overlap the shields above them. In nearly all of the snake's relatives, the third scale overlaps the one beside the eye, a pattern known as T-III.
\n\n\n\nThe Gyirong blind snake shows a rarer arrangement, called T-V, in which both the second and third lip scales overlap the shields above. Few documented members of its genus share this feature, which provides a clean and reliable way to separate it from most of its kin.
\n\n\n\nAnatomy alone did not settle the matter. The team sequenced two mitochondrial genes and placed the snake within a broad evolutionary tree. It nested firmly within Indotyphlops, as the sister lineage to I. albiceps, but its genetic divergence was substantial. For one gene, it differed from its closest relatives with available data by more than 24 per cent, and for another by more than 18 per cent, margins far beyond what is typically seen within a single species.
\n\n\n\nThe name honours the place of discovery. Gyirongensis refers to Gyirong Town in Gyirong County, where the holotype was found, and it is formed as a noun in apposition. The authors propose the English common name \"Gyirong blind snake\" and the Chinese name \u5409\u9686\u76f2\u86c7 (J\u00edl\u00f3ng M\u00e1ngsh\u00e9).
\n\n\n\nBecause the type locality sits so close to the Nepalese border, the researchers consider it highly likely that the species also lives on the other side, thus pending further fieldwork.
\n\n\n\nOriginal source:
\n\n\n\nLyu B, Tan S, Zhao Z, Wallach V, Liu Q, Guo P (2026) A new species of blind snake, Indotyphlops (Serpentes, Typhlopidae), from the Qinghai-Xizang Plateau, China. ZooKeys 1292: 261-273. https://doi.org/10.3897/zookeys.1292.197322
\n\n\n\nFor more articles on zoology, visit the ZooKeys website and follow the journal on BlueSky and Facebook.
\n\n","doi":"https://doi.org/10.59350/bevq4-rc013","guid":"https://blog.pensoft.net/?p=21081","image":"https://blog.pensoft.net/wp-content/uploads/2026/10/SciComm-PR-2026-Instagram-2026-10-02T120406.577.png","language":"en","license":"https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/legalcode","published_at":1791158400,"rid":"eq0f7-sw868","summary":"Tweet High on the Qinghai-Xizang Plateau, often called the \"Roof of the World,\" a new species of snake waits beneath the stones\u2026 Scientists from Yibin University and collaborating institutions have formally described Indotyphlops gyirongensis , the Gyirong blind snake, a discovery that adds a new member to one of the least understood branches of the snake family tree.","tags":["Zookeys","Biodiversity","Blind Snake","Fieldwork","Nepal"],"title":"A Blind Snake on the Roof of the World: New Burrowing Species Discovered Beneath the Stones of the Qinghai-Xizang Plateau","updated_at":1791358254,"url":"https://blog.pensoft.net/2026/10/05/a-blind-snake-on-the-roof-of-the-world-new-burrowing-species-discovered-beneath-the-stones-of-the-qinghai-xizang-plateau/","version":"v1"},{"authors":[{"contributor_roles":[],"name":"Pensoft Editorial Team"}],"blog":{"authors":null,"community_id":"1e54953c-587a-4743-89af-ebd2cb45660c","created":1789516800,"current_feed_url":null,"description":null,"doi":"https://doi.org/10.59350/pensoft","favicon":"https://rogue-scholar.org/api/communities/1e54953c-587a-4743-89af-ebd2cb45660c/logo","feed_format":"application/atom+xml","feed_url":"https://blog.pensoft.net/feed/atom/","filter":null,"generator":"WordPress","home_page_url":"https://blog.pensoft.net/","issn":null,"language":"eng","license":"https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/legalcode","prefix":"10.59350","relative_url":null,"secure":true,"slug":"pensoft","status":"active","subfield":"2303","title":"Pensoft Blog","updated":1791294673,"use_api":true},"blog_name":"Pensoft Blog","blog_slug":"pensoft","content_html":"\n\nThere is a Chinese saying that east or west, Guilin scenery is the best. Guilin and Chongqing, located in the western part of China, are famous for their many mountains and rivers. They also harbor unique flora and fauna, such as the scaly-sided merganser, a globally endangered species restricted to eastern Asia.
\n\n\n\nIn 2023 and 2024, Dr. Yitong Ma from Nantong University, China, collected springtail specimens from the Huaping Nature Reserve in Guilin and the Yintiaoling Nature Reserve in Chongqing.
\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nSpringtails are the most common arthropods living in the soil – you can find them in your yard, in the flowerpot, or on the lawn,
\nhe says.
\"Although they are very small, usually 2-3 mm in length, their density can be amazing. As decomposers, they can break down the organic matter and promote material cycling, so they play an important key role in soil ecosystems.\"
\n\n\n\nAfter checking the specimens from the two reserves under microscopes, Dr. Ma and his colleague from Nantong University, Xiaowei Qian, found rich biodiversity and about 80 different species of springtails. In a study published in the open-access journal ZooKeys, they described five new scaled species belonging to three genera of the springtail family Entomobryidae.
\n\n\n\nThe genus Lepidodens contains five species, all found in China. The researchers find one new species, which is also the first species of the genus from the western part of China.
\n\n\n\nThey also report the first sighting in China of the genus Lepidosira, which thrives best in Oceania. In Huaping Nature Reserve and Yintiaoling Nature Reserve, they found three new species of the genus.
\n\n\n\nAmong the fifty species of the genus Willowsia in the world, about 30 species have been reported from China. However, the authors concluded this genus is not well represented in the two reserves, and only found one new species in Chongqing.
\n\n\n\nIn the future, the researchers will further study those specimens collected from the two reserves.
\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nGiven the subtropical monsoon climate, mountainous topography and little human disturbance of the reserves, it is likely that more new species will be found,
\nthey say.
Original source:
\n\n\n\nQian X-W, Ma Y-T (2026) Five new species of Entomobryinae (Collembola, Entomobryidae) from China. ZooKeys 1275: 81-115. https://doi.org/10.3897/zookeys.1275.158254
\n\n","doi":"https://doi.org/10.59350/h2syw-84k40","guid":"https://blog.pensoft.net/?p=19054","image":"https://blog.pensoft.net/wp-content/uploads/2026/06/Annual-Awards-Editors-Choice-2025-19.png","language":"en","license":"https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/legalcode","published_at":1781740800,"rid":"xfscr-gh359","summary":"Tweet There is a Chinese saying that east or west, Guilin scenery is the best. Guilin and Chongqing, located in the western part of China, are famous for their many mountains and rivers. They also harbor unique flora and fauna, such as the scaly-sided merganser, a globally endangered species restricted to eastern Asia.","tags":["Zookeys","Biodiversity","Invertebrates","Lepidodens","New Species"],"title":"Beautiful Scenery, Rich Biodiversity: New Springtail Species Discovered In China","updated_at":1791358251,"url":"https://blog.pensoft.net/2026/06/18/beautiful-scenery-rich-bodiversity-new-springtail-species-discovered-in-china/","version":"v1"},{"authors":[{"contributor_roles":[],"name":"Pensoft Editorial Team"}],"blog":{"authors":null,"community_id":"1e54953c-587a-4743-89af-ebd2cb45660c","created":1789516800,"current_feed_url":null,"description":null,"doi":"https://doi.org/10.59350/pensoft","favicon":"https://rogue-scholar.org/api/communities/1e54953c-587a-4743-89af-ebd2cb45660c/logo","feed_format":"application/atom+xml","feed_url":"https://blog.pensoft.net/feed/atom/","filter":null,"generator":"WordPress","home_page_url":"https://blog.pensoft.net/","issn":null,"language":"eng","license":"https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/legalcode","prefix":"10.59350","relative_url":null,"secure":true,"slug":"pensoft","status":"active","subfield":"2303","title":"Pensoft Blog","updated":1791294673,"use_api":true},"blog_name":"Pensoft Blog","blog_slug":"pensoft","content_html":"\n\nBetween 13-17 September 2026, Pensoft Publishers joined the Nordic Oikos-Gf\u00d6 2026 conference, jointly organised by the Nordic Society Oikos and the Ecological Society of Germany, Austria and Switzerland (Gf\u00d6) in Odense, Denmark.
\n\n\n\nThemed \"Integrating the Diversity of Ecology\", the event welcomed over 1,000 researchers in the field from across career stages, who had the opportunity to enjoy conference talks across 36 thematic sessions, as many as six keynote talks, two poster sessions, several open society meetings and quite a few social events, including excursions and a conference dinner.
\n\n\n\nThroughout the scientific event, conference delegates had the opportunity to also explore the various publishing services offered by Pensoft to authors of research, journal managers, conference organisers; the diverse portfolio of almost 100 open-access peer-reviewed journals published on Pensoft's ARPHA Publishing Platform.
\n\n\n\nBeyond publishing solutions, a key focus was given to OBSGESSION: a Horizon Europe-funded project where Pensoft is actively involved. To better understand and predict changes in terrestrial and freshwater ecosystems, the OBSGESSION consortium integrates multi-source Earth Observation data (such as high-resolution satellite imagery and drone monitoring) with ground-based in-situ research, including advanced environmental DNA (eDNA) sampling. By coupling these data streams with cutting-edge detection-attribution modelling and machine learning algorithms, the project generates scalable Essential Biodiversity Variables (EBVs). These ecological approaches and analytical frameworks are actively tested and validated through six biodiversity pilots across diverse European ecosystems. In the open-science Research Ideas and Outcomes journal, you can find a collection of project outputs, including research papers, project reports and deliverables, and guideline papers published across journals and platforms.
\n\n\n\nAs a leader of the \"Dissemination, Multi-stakeholder outreach and synergies\" work package at OBSGESSION, Pensoft is tasked with stakeholder engagement and community building, ultimately contributing to the high impact of the resulting outputs, methodologies and policy recommendations that aim to strengthen public understanding of biodiversity change.
\n\n\n\n*
\n\n\n\nOne of the six keynote talks was presented by Prof. Dr. Isabell Hensen (Martin Luther University Halle, Germany), who received the Gf\u00d6 Honorary Medal 2026 for her leading, forward-looking contributions to ecological research and the scientific community. Her work examines how genetic variation, environmental conditions, disturbance, and plant-animal interactions shape plant populations, with particular emphasis on rare species, biological invasions, and the regeneration of degraded forests.
\n\n\n\nIn her talk, titled \"One spark is enough: regeneration ecology of Andean forests under global change\", she reported on post-fire regeneration processes in tropical Andean forests, based on long-term field experiments and observational studies.
\n\n\n\nHensen focused on the well-studied endemic plant genus Polylepis, which forms the world's highest-elevation forests and illustrates how fire has shaped ecosystem dynamics over millennia. Her talk also mentioned a 2022 monograph of the genus, published in the Pensoft journal PhytoKeys by Tatiana Erika Boza Espinoza (Pontificia Universidad Cat\u00f3lica del Per\u00fa) and Michael Kessler (University of Zurich), which brought together results from 35 years of field and herbarium experience.
\n\n\n\n*
\n\n\n\nOn Wednesday, Pensoft's Iva Boyadzhieva delivered a presentation titled “Scholarly Communication: Lessons from the Publisher’s Kitchen”. She highlighted the vital role publishers play in helping researchers communicate their insights not only to peers, but also to decision-makers and the public. Emphasizing the publisher’s responsibility to support authors with robust infrastructure and dedicated human expertise, she outlined how Pensoft works to FAIRify scholarly publishing and future-proof scientific knowledge in an era of rapid AI development and expanding research output.
\n\n\n\n*
\n\n\n\nPensoft's team was delighted to meet up with dedicated readers, authors, reviewers, and editors from across Pensoft's portfolio, as well as introduce Pensoft journals to attendees discovering them for the first time.
\n\n\n\nUnsurprisingly, well-established society journals published by Pensoft, such as Frontiers of Biogeography, NeoBiota, Vegetation Classification and Survey, Vegetation Ecology and Diversity and Italian Botanist drew plenty of attention, alongside long-standing Pensoft's own titles like Nature Conservation, PhytoKeys, One Ecosystem and the Biodiversity Data Journal.
\n\n\n\nVisitors were also particularly intrigued by several newly launched Pensoft journals. Developed in close collaboration with passionate researchers, these fresh outlets directly address key gaps in academic publishing.
\n\n\n\nOne of the newly launched journals in the spotlight was Agricultural and Environmental Modelling (AEM), which provides a unique scholarly outlet thanks to its modern approach to publishing by increasing transparency, giving credit to research objects across the entire modelling research lifecycle. This is achieved through publishing specialised article types, such as: Formal Model, Model Testing and Calibration, Model Implementation and Documentation, Data Papers and Software Descriptions. These new publishing formats are designed to keep pace with advances in Modelling research and to make it FAIR (Findable, Accessible, Interoperable, and Reusable) by enabling scholarly credit for diverse research outputs, often created by different groups of authors. For the time being, AEM remains a Diamond Open Access journal, meaning that it will not charge authors for open-access publication.\u00a0
\n\n\n\nOther recently founded journals addressing emerging and fast-developing disciplines within the ecological field that took the spotlight were:
\n\n\n\nAll of these journals operate with no article fees for either authors, nor readers.
\n\n\n\nTo receive updates on new publications and relevant news, sign up for Email Alerts on any journal's homepage. Creating a Pensoft account also allows users to easily customise their notification preferences, follow additional journals, or filter updates by research topic. You can also follow journals on social media, including BlueSky, Facebook and Linkedin.
\n\n\n\n*
\n\n\n\nDelegates at the event showed strong interest in OBSGESSION's first policy brief: \"Prioritising Essential Biodiversity Variables (EBVs) to support European Union (EU) policy needs based on the EU's Biodiversity Strategy for 2030.\" To tackle a critical challenge in environmental monitoring, OBSGESSION focuses on prioritising key EBVs to directly support the EU Biodiversity Strategy 2030 – a roadmap designed to put Europe's biodiversity on a path to recovery through 102 specific actions and sub-actions.
\n\n\n\nTo align these policy needs with actionable data, the OBSGESSION team conducted an assessment to identify priority EBV candidates. By categorising EBV-applicable actions and indicators across different ecosystem realms and implementation stages, the project pinpointed the most essential variables needed to strengthen monitoring, reporting, and policy execution. The document is based on a deliverable by the project (D1.1 Policy Landscape and Needs Assessment).
\n\n\n\nThis policy brief is part of a broader, ongoing effort within OBSGESSION to bridge the gap between biodiversity data and policy execution. To dive deeper into the science behind this topic, the project has hosted a dedicated seminar series exploring key aspects of the framework:
\n\n\n\nBeyond theoretical frameworks, OBSGESSION grounds its research in six biodiversity validation pilots across Europe. The case studies represent European biodiversity and ecosystem conservation challenges at scales varying from local to regional. Full details on each ecosystem pilot are now available in a collection of newly published pilot factsheets, which made their debut at the conference, where people could take a look at their digital versions.
\n\n\n\nReading those materials gives an insight into the practical testing environment to demonstrate how Earth observation, field research, and ecological modelling come together to deliver actionable biodiversity insights. You can also check out OBSGESSION's biodiversity pilots on the project's website.
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\n\n\n\nTo relive the conference by exploring the detailed programme alongside the full abstracts, visit the conference website.
\n\n\n\nKeep up with future updates and news from Pensoft by following us on Bluesky, Facebook, X, and LinkedIn.
\n\n","doi":"https://doi.org/10.59350/0261d-tmz21","guid":"https://blog.pensoft.net/?p=20944","image":"https://blog.pensoft.net/wp-content/uploads/2026/09/SciComm-PR-2026-Instagram-2026-09-25T164847.347-e1790348402124.png","language":"en","license":"https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/legalcode","published_at":1790640000,"rid":"1zdgz-txj12","summary":"Between 13-17 September 2026, Pensoft Publishers joined the Nordic Oikos-Gf\u00d6 2026 conference in Odense, Denmark.","tags":["Advances In Pollinator Research","Agricultural And Environmental Modelling","Biodiversity Data Journal","BioRisk","Frontiers Of Biogeography"],"title":"Pensoft at the Nordic Oikos-Gf\u00d6 2026 conference: Integrating the Diversity of Ecology","updated_at":1791358247,"url":"https://blog.pensoft.net/2026/09/29/pensoft-at-the-nordic-oikos-gfo-2026-conference-integrating-the-diversity-of-ecology/","version":"v1"},{"authors":[{"contributor_roles":[],"name":"Pensoft Editorial Team"}],"blog":{"authors":null,"community_id":"1e54953c-587a-4743-89af-ebd2cb45660c","created":1789516800,"current_feed_url":null,"description":null,"doi":"https://doi.org/10.59350/pensoft","favicon":"https://rogue-scholar.org/api/communities/1e54953c-587a-4743-89af-ebd2cb45660c/logo","feed_format":"application/atom+xml","feed_url":"https://blog.pensoft.net/feed/atom/","filter":null,"generator":"WordPress","home_page_url":"https://blog.pensoft.net/","issn":null,"language":"eng","license":"https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/legalcode","prefix":"10.59350","relative_url":null,"secure":true,"slug":"pensoft","status":"active","subfield":"2303","title":"Pensoft Blog","updated":1791294673,"use_api":true},"blog_name":"Pensoft Blog","blog_slug":"pensoft","content_html":"\n\nLast week marked another annual meeting of the Biodiversity Information Standards network, otherwise known as TDWG, with the Norwegian capital Oslo hosting the event between 21 and 25 September.
\n\n\n\nTDWG is the international, non-profit organisation formerly known as the Taxonomic Databases Working Group, which develops and maintains the standards, such as Darwin Core, that allow biodiversity data to be shared, integrated and understood across institutions worldwide.
\n\n\n\nThe six-day programme was a meeting point for over 300 stakeholders from research, practitioner and corporate circles, with proceedings centred around one central topic – \"Research and Robot-Ready Biodiversity Data Standards\". In that sense, the themes of accessibility, responsibility, innovation and collaboration were foremost on the minds of participants as they contemplated how information on the biosphere should be extracted, consolidated and shared in the years to come.
\n\n\n\nAs a long-standing partner of TDWG, Pensoft Publishers served as both a sponsor and an exhibitor for the event. In the latter capacity, the company contributed with a joint booth for three of the EU-funded projects it is leading the outreach efforts for:
\n\n\n\nA number of other projects from Pensoft's communication portfolio also found a place in the display, including BEAGLE, OneSTOP, B-Cubed, MAMBO, OBSGESSION and BioAgora. Furthermore, 14 of the company's journals were in the spotlight, including Biodiversity Information Science and Standards (BISS), the official journal of the TDWG community (where all of the conference's abstracts are set to be published).
\n\n\n\nCrucially, the event also saw the official launch of ORPHO, Pensoft's new collaborative workspace for scientific writing. Founder and CEO Prof. Lyubomir Penev and CTO Teodor Georgiev conducted live demos of the tool, showcasing how manuscripts crafted within it with full version control for authors become discoverable, interoperable and FAIR-compliant.
\n\n\n\nIn the context of TDWG2026's agenda, they also presented ORPHO's integrated semantic annotation and communication instruments as part of the workshop \"How Literature Services can Support & Benefit from Biodiversity Publication and Data Standards?\" on 24 September. The workspace was received with anticipation and enthusiasm by attendees, with many expressing a desire to test it out for themselves.
\n\n\n\nThey were also treated with a tease of Pensoft's next large-scale endeavour, as Senior Communications Officer Peter Bozakov pulled the curtain behind the forthcoming communication platform for research projects Scientiana.
\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nAs for other notable contributions to the wider conference agenda by researchers affiliated with Pensoft's publishing or project activities:
\n\n\n\nNotably, the Biodiversity Information Science and Standards (BISS) journal is the home for TDWG conference abstracts. TDWG 2026 presenters can currently submit their abstracts there and publish them in an extended abstract or mini-paper format completely free of charge. The journal also hosts abstracts from conferences held over the past decade. You can browse the TDWG 2026 collection here.
\n\n\n\nLast but not least, the company's sponsorship supported two awards at TDWG2026 (with a free publication in a Pensoft journal as an accompanying prize):
\n\n\n\nOverall, TDWG2026 proved itself a crucial forum for mapping out the future of biodiversity monitoring and the management of the myriad data streams that emerge from it. Pensoft is proud to be an important actor in this process, contributing with innovative tools and solutions at the heart of the interface between research and practice. As summarised by Prof. Penev:
\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\"Given its status as a large-scale conference centred around the future of biodiversity sciences in the age of AI, TDWG2026 was a crucial venue for unveiling Pensoft's forward-looking vision for academic publishing and science communication. The \"pearl\" of these pursuits is undoubtedly the ORPHO workspace, a tool that is well-placed to introduce a new standard when it comes to collaborative AI-FAIR research in Europe and beyond.\"
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\n\n\n\nFollow us on Bluesky, Facebook, X, and LinkedIn for future conference updates.
\n\n","doi":"https://doi.org/10.59350/zhfwk-5vr68","guid":"https://blog.pensoft.net/?p=20987","image":"https://blog.pensoft.net/wp-content/uploads/2026/10/SciComm-PR-2026-Instagram-2026-09-28T132928.181.png","language":"en","license":"https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/legalcode","published_at":1790812800,"rid":"w2baa-avn79","summary":"Last week marked another annual meeting of the Biodiversity Information Standards network, otherwise known as TDWG, with the Norwegian capital Oslo hosting the event between 20 and 25 September.","tags":["Advances In Pollinator Research","Agricultural And Environmental Modelling","Biodiversity Data Journal","BISS Journal","Individual-based Ecology"],"title":"Pensoft at TDWG2026: Pushing the boundaries of innovation in biodiversity data management forward","updated_at":1791358243,"url":"https://blog.pensoft.net/2026/10/01/pensoft-at-tdwg2026-pushing-the-boundaries-of-innovation-in-biodiversity-data-management-forward/","version":"v1"}],"out_of":57744,"page":1,"per_page":10,"total-results":57744}