The National Biological Information Infrastructure: coming of age

Coordinated by the US Geological Survey, the National Biological Information Infrastructure (NBII) is a Web‐based system that provides increased access to data and information on the nation’s biological resources. The NBII can be viewed from a variety of perspectives. This article – an individual case study and not a broad survey with extensive references to the literature – addresses the structure of the NBII related to thematic sections, infrastructure sections and place‐based sections, and other topics such as the Integrated Taxonomic Information System (one of our more innovative tools) and the development of our controlled vocabulary.