Biology Roadmap 2021

Vol. 16, No.
2, 2021
swiss-academies.ch
Biology Roadmap
for Research Infrastructures 2025–2028
by the Swiss Biology Community
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Swiss Academy of Sciences (SCNAT) • Platform Biology
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RECOMMENDED FORM OF CITATION

Brunner D, Durinx C, Erb M, Fischer M, Hari Y, Jazwinska A, Leeb T, Reymond C, Scheidegger C,
Stieger P, Studer B, Vergères G, Walter A (2021)
Biology Roadmap for Research Infrastructures 2025–2028 by the Swiss Biology Community
Swiss Academies Reports 16 (2)
SCNAT ROADMAP COORDINATION

Hans-Rudolf Ott • Marc Türler
AUTHORS
Damian Brunner (University of Zurich) • Christine Durinx (SIB Swiss Institute of Bioinformatics) • Matthias Erb
(University of Bern) • Markus Fischer (University of Bern) • Yvonne Hari (SCNAT) • Anna Jazwinska (University of
Fribourg) • Tosso Leeb (University of Bern) • Caroline Reymond (SCNAT) • Christoph Scheidegger (WSL) • Pia Stieger
(SCNAT) • Bruno Studer (ETH Zurich) • Guy Vergères (Agroscope) • Achim Walter (ETH Zurich)
EDITORS
Yvonne Hari • Caroline Reymond • Pia Stieger
CONTRIBUTORS
Alice Cibois • Loïc Costeur • Christine Currat • Werner Eugster • Michael Greeff • Mark Ibberson • Marko Kaksonen •
Prisca Liberali • Lucas Pelkmans • Timm Schroeder • Henning Stahlberg • Suliana Manley • Francesca Peri •
Oliver Pertz-Garo • Michelle Price • Michaël Unser • Peter Wandeler • Karsten Weis
REVIEW
Donat Agosti • Felix Althaus • Nadir Alvarez • Ron Appel • Jordi Bascompte • Wolfram Brück • Stefan Eggenberg •
Adrian Egli • Andreas Ensslin • Janet Hering • Corinne Jud • Pilar Junier • Seraina Klopfstein • Ohad Medalia •
Diego Moretti • Mathieu Perret • Didier Picard • Sergio Rasmann • Serge Rezzi • Torsten Schwede • Fred Stauffer •
Laurent Vallotton • Daniel Von der Mühll • Fabian Wahl • Robert Waterhouse
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Melissa Dawes
LAYOUT
Olivia Zwygart (SCNAT)
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Pp. 4, 10, 12, 18, 20, 42, 44, 46: Yvonne Hari
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Biology Roadmap
for Research Infrastructures 2025–2028
by the Swiss Biology Community
Content
1 Executive Summary��3
2 Findings and Recommendations��5
3 Introduction��11
4 Purpose and scope of this roadmap��13
5 Biology: the study of life��14

5.1 Biology and its organisational levels��14
5.2 The history of biology.................................................................................................................................14
5.3 The significance of technology................................................................................................................14
5.4 Environmental and societal challenges ahead...................................................................................15
6 The current Swiss research landscape and the international context��16

6.1 Biological research in Switzerland��16
6.2 International collaboration........................................................................................................................17
7 Vision for the future��19
8 Development of national infrastructures and Swiss participation

in international organisations (2025–2028)��21
8.1 SwissBioCollection: biobanks and natural history collections......................................................21
8.1.1 Repositories of past, present and future scientific knowledge................................................... 21
8.1.2 Proposed developments....................................................................................................................................24
8.2 SwissBioSites................................................................................................................................................ 27
8.2.1 Long-term and large-scale investigations of natural and managed e cosystems...........27
8.2.1 Proposed developments................................................................................................................................... 30
8.3 SwissBioData................................................................................................................................................. 32
8.3.1 Enabling and fostering data-driven discoveries..................................................................................32
8.3.2 Proposed developments....................................................................................................................................35
8.4 SwissBioImaging..........................................................................................................................................38
8.4.1 Image-driven discoveries................................................................................................................................. 38
8.4.2 Proposed developments...................................................................................................................................40
9 Conclusions............................................................................................................................................................. 43
10 Appendix �� 45
Swiss Academies Reports, Vol. 16, No. 2, 2021 3
1 Executive Summary
Biology is the study of life in all of its diverse manifesta- The need for four dedicated network infrastructures is
tions. It involves investigations of the functioning, origin described in this roadmap: SwissBioCollection is focused
and evolution of organisms, as well as their interactions on building the technical infrastructure needed for the
with other organisms and with their environment. Con- digitisation, curation and coordination of natural his-
sequently, biological research is essential to understand, tory collections and biobanks for scientific discovery.
protect and improve the well-being of all life on our plan- SwissBioSites involves the establishment of a network of
et. In fact, many biological discoveries are motivated by experimental sites to study and monitor natural and an-
societal and environmental issues. Biological research thropogenic drivers of change in ecosystems. SwissBioData
continuously contributes to efforts to tackle the global is focused on facilitating the production, standardisation,
challenges we face today, including climate change, the integration, analysis and sharing of large biological data-
excessive exploitation of natural resources and biodiver- sets, in particular regarding -omics data. SwissBioImaging is
sity loss. Moreover, it helps us to design better and more dedicated to the analysis of complex biological imaging
sustainable means to improve the health and well-being data, which poses specific challenges in terms of unprec-
of humans and animals alike. edented volumes of data, data richness and the lack of
efficient, accessible tools for image analysis.
Possible solutions to complex global challenges require
insights from multiple fields and interdisciplinary ap- Common to all four infrastructures described herein is
proaches. The boundaries between sub-fields are fading, the challenge of comprehensive data exploitation, which
as are the distinctions between fundamental, translation- often constitutes a limiting bottleneck. This challenge
al and applied research. Moreover, current research often extends far beyond mere data storage to all steps of data
combines sub-fields of biology, as well as physics, chemis- management. The configuration and setup of instrumen-
try, geoscience and computer science. This development tation should go hand-in-hand with the development of
is manifested in many areas, including biomedicine, nu- data analysis procedures that match both data acquisi-
tritional science, systems biology and ecology. While the tion schemes and data exploitation goals. Coordination
transition from disciplinary towards interdisciplinary re- between research groups is required to standardise work-
search is well under way in the Swiss biology community, flows and streamline this development. Data management
it is often not fully represented on the institutional level. should achieve two major goals: interoperability of exper-
imental datasets, as well as procedures that respect the
The trend towards interdisciplinary approaches is ade- specific requirements of the numerous sub-fields of biol-
quately met by multi-nodal networks. Moreover, network ogy. Therefore, in spite of the presence of somewhat re-
infrastructures match the decentralised organisation of lated challenges in several fields of biology, four separate,
the Swiss biology community, which consists of numer- dedicated network infrastructures are proposed to keep
ous specialised research groups representing a wide range Switzerland at the forefront of international research in
of public and private entities, each of which provides biology.
high-level expertise in a specific area. Consequently, we
recommend that research infrastructures for biology take The proposed infrastructures were identified in the course
the form of networks, whereas, in contrast to other dis- of an 18-month process starting in July 2019. Biologists
ciplines like physics, large single-site core facilities are from all fields and regions across Switzerland were in-
less suitable. The importance of network infrastructures is vited to participate in and contribute to the elaboration
mirrored on the international and European levels: many of the present roadmap. They were contacted through
of the European Research Infrastructure Consortia (ERIC) the SCNAT’s Platform Biology of the Swiss Academy of
are structured as networks connecting peers and institu- Sciences, its specialised societies and the professional
tions across numerous countries. networks of all members of these societies.
2 Findings and Recommendations
General Findings
Finding 1: In the field of biology, specimen sampling and Finding 2: Competitive research is not possible without in-
data generation are increasing exponentially, but inte- ternational networking and the ability to attract world-
grated data exploitation poses a limiting bottleneck. To wide attention. Regarding international infrastructures,
improve and exploit the generation and availability of bi- Switzerland’s location in Europe means that European
ological data and materials, but also to investigate com- initiatives and programmes are considered the most im-
plex intradisciplinary and interdisciplinary questions, portant for Swiss biologists.
the research community would benefit immensely from
coordinated experimental approaches, common adopted
standards and shared large-scale infrastructures. Recommendation 2: Switzerland should remain committed to
international collaboration in order to connect its collective
academic expertise to international networks. It is crucial to
Recommendation 1: To facilitate the democratisation of data establish strong national infrastructures that can serve as
exploitation, local nodes with infrastructure should be cre- significant nodes in European networks, thus strengthening
ated and/or strengthened, and expertise concentrated at the ties between Swiss and foreign researchers.
these nodes should be shared with the broader scientific
community. These decentralised nodes should form highly
interconnected networks, coordinated by central hubs that
streamline data generation, interoperability and exploita-
tion. Within these networks, hardware, tools and specialised
skills should be intertwined to coordinate and balance re-
sources for data acquisition and data analysis.
6 Biology Roadmap for Research Infrastructures 2025–2028 by the Swiss Biology Community
National infrastructures
SwissBioCollection
Finding 3: Biologically relevant
samples and specimens and the Recommendation 3a: We recommend the establishment of
associated metadata, held in sci- SwissBioCollection to promote the storage, management
entific collections and biobanks, and curation of current and future natural history collections
have become essential in integra- and biobanks in Switzerland. SwissBioCollection should be
tive research programmes for a organised as a decentralised network and should incorpo-
vast set of scientific questions and as a source of scien- rate the expertise of multiple institutions.
tific discovery. Such biological collections are essential Recommendation 3b: Physical and virtual access to spec-
for understanding our living planet and how organisms imens and to biodiversity and geodiversity information
have evolved, as well as how they may react to anthropo- should be unified by generating a Swiss Virtual Natural His-
genic changes. However, these collections are individual- tory Collection. The intention of the Swiss Virtual Natural
ly curated across multiple institutions, sometimes under History Collection is to provide new and efficient means of
different management standards. To facilitate future re- open and interlinked access. This field of action should build
search, the huge volume of data held in these collections on the harmonisation and digitisation processes developed
needs to be harmonised and digitised, and access needs through existing initiatives, namely the Swiss Natural Histo-
to be fully centralised. At present, only 17% of the spec- ry Collection Network (SwissCollNet) and the Global Biodiver-
imens in the Swiss natural history collections have been sity Information Facility (GBIF). Moreover, a well-established
digitised. Coordination of the collections and biobanks reference system for taxonomic names, such as the Cata-
would facilitate this process, placing Switzerland among logue of Life, should be applied to link samples and make
the leaders in this field in Europe. them accessible to the community at large.
Recommendation 3c: Physical and virtual access to samples
stored in biobanks should be unified. This would require the
development of harmonised common datasets for specific
types of samples and the compilation of a comprehensive
catalogue of all biobanked samples in Switzerland. A nation-
al coordination platform is already in place with the Swiss
Biobanking Platform. However, the envisioned catalogue of
samples and associated metadata would require additional
decentralised infrastructure and personnel.
Recommendation 3d: Museum collections should be inte-
grated with biobanks to help to harmonise processes and
quality standards between collections and biobanks, ena-
bling synergies with biomedical research.
SwissBioSites SwissBioData
Finding 4: Ecosystems provide Finding 5: The current revolution
essential services to society. To in biological, nutritional and bi-
understand the value of these omedical research is fuelled by
services and the ability of ecosys- large (-omics) datasets and ad-
tems to provide them, studies on vanced, integrated analyses of
the diversity and functioning of different data types. All areas
ecosystems, as well as drivers of change in natural and of society and research are encountering an explosion
anthropogenic ecosystems, are becoming increasingly im- of digitisation, which has led to the generation of huge
portant. Pursuing this common goal, researchers in ecolo- amounts of data. These datasets can potentially be used to
gy, agriculture and forestry share many common concepts address fundamental, global research questions. Research
and ask similar questions. However, the communities infrastructures designed to enable the standardised gen-
would benefit from greater connectivity and tighter inte- eration of and access to high-quality datasets represent
gration of existing infrastructures to increase the scope, a major driver for innovation, accelerating both science
scale and relevance of their research. and associated entrepreneurship. However, current infra-
structures are not capable of supporting an integrated data
generation and exploitation approach, especially in mul-
Recommendation 4a: We recommend the establishment of ti-omics. Indeed, many Swiss researchers do not have ac-
SwissBioSites, a network integrating the expertise of mul- cess to sufficient support for the analysis of their data, nor
tiple fields, including ecology, agriculture and forestry, to to infrastructure that facilitates the combination and anal-
extend the scope and scale of ongoing research on ecosys- ysis of large datasets or that allows federated analyses.
tems.
Recommendation 4b: SwissBioSites should encompass a
combination of highly instrumented experimental sites es- Recommendation 5a: We recommend the establishment of
tablished for long-term experimentation and spatially wide- SwissBioData, a scalable and sustainable translational net-
ly distributed permanent plots of land and monitoring sites, work, building on the expertise within the SIB Swiss Institute
covering terrestrial and aquatic ecosystems. This network of for Bioinformatics, as well as the existing -omics platforms
dedicated sites would greatly advance research, as it would and local bioinformatics core facilities.
provide the analytical and statistical power required to ad- Recommendation 5b: SwissBioData should enable the crea-
dress pressing fundamental and applied research questions tion, sharing, combination, analysis and application of bio-
in ecology, agriculture and forestry. The network should in- logical data from diverse basic and applied disciplines. This
clude a central hub to provide expertise and instrumentation would enable the collection of longitudinal data. In particular,
for field experiments and analyses and to facilitate maxi- coordinated hardware standards and unified workflows are
mum synergies within the field of biology and between biol- needed to connect different -omics approaches across or-
ogy and geosciences. ganisms and scales, to link them with data from literature
and databases, and to leverage the potential of petabytes
of research data from public databases and publicly funded
grants – including EU and SNSF grants – that are deposited
in FAIR (Findable, Accessible, Interoperable and Reusable)
repositories.
Recommendation 5c: The SwissBioData network should be
aligned with the goals of SwissBioSites and SwissBioImag-
ing, which would in turn profit considerably from such an
overarching, integrative infrastructure in the form of a net-
work that supports individual nodes for -omics data genera-
tion and experimentation and that includes a central hub to
establish and coordinate workflows and integrate datasets.
SwissBioImaging
Finding 6: New imaging technol-

ogies and tools have revolu- Recommendation 6a: We recommend the establishment of
tionised science and society in SwissBioImaging, an infrastructure including an institute
general, and especially the life specialised in the numerous aspects of image data process-
sciences and medical research. ing and analysis. SwissBioImaging should be attractive to
They facilitate multi-dimension- world-class experts, in particular experts on relevant artifi-
al live monitoring and the measurement of numerous cial intelligence (AI) technologies.
aspects of dynamic biological processes at all relevant Recommendation 6b: SwissBioImaging should develop and
scales, ranging from whole communities of organisms implement generally applicable high-end analysis solutions
down to the three-dimensional structures of proteins, and coordinate and distribute efforts, resources and servic-
DNA and RNA. These technologies and tools generate es of life scientists at the national and international level.
multiple types of highly complex biological datasets of This would give Swiss life sciences a massive competitive
unprecedented magnitude. Switzerland is at the forefront advantage in the worldwide context. Because digital images
in terms of image acquisition technologies. However, the represent a universal language, this infrastructure has the
scientific community has only scratched the surface of the potential to integrate the needs of other research commu-
full potential of the collected image data, leaving substan- nities, such as medicine, geography and agriculture, where
tial amounts of information unused. This is due to criti- increasingly complex imaging datasets are being generated
cal limitations on the analysis side, which is still in its and where live images support and optimise human and ro-
infancy. Furthermore, a lack of standardisation prevents botic activities in real time.
the exploitation of image datasets unfamiliar to individ- Recommendation 6c: Finally, SwissBioImaging should sub-
ual research groups. All of this makes image analysis a stantially improve current strategic and financial efforts of
highly demanding task that is currently only possible financing bodies and of Swiss universities and naturally fos-
at a small number of laboratories. Consequently, most ter innovation and industrial applications.
Swiss researchers are a large step away from comprehen-
sive and internationally competitive image data analysis.
International infrastructures
Finding 7: Swiss biologists benefit from membership in in-

ternational networks and organisations, in particular in Recommendation 7a: Switzerland should remain a member
institutions connecting Swiss biologists with their peers of the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL) and
in Europe. Through international organisations, Swiss re- the European Molecular Biology Organisation (EMBO), which
searchers gain access to key user facilities and platforms to provide innovative research environments and platforms for
share data and innovative approaches. In order to remain molecular biologists, in particular young researchers.
at the forefront of research, Swiss biologists need to be in- Recommendation 7b: Complementing national initiatives
ternationally connected in two ways. First, they need to on biological collections, Switzerland should become a full
participate in international exchange and collaboration in member of the Distributed Systems of Scientific Collections
their specific sub-field. Second, they need access to inter- (DiSSCo) as soon as possible. Moreover, Switzerland should
national initiatives fostering interdisciplinary exchange. maintain its membership in the Global Biodiversity Informa-
tion Facility (GBIF).
Recommendation 7c: Concerning biobanks, Switzerland
presently holds an observer status at the Biobanking and
Biomolecular Resource Research Infrastructure (BBMRI) and
should become a full member in the near future.
Recommendation 7d: To contribute to pan-European climate
monitoring, Switzerland should remain part of the Integrated
Carbon Observation System (ICOS).
Recommendation 7e: Switzerland should join efforts to inter-
nationally coordinate the investigation of biodiversity and
ecosystem functioning through LifeWatch ERIC. Similarly,
Switzerland should engage in the coordination of plant phe-
notyping on the European level through participation in EM-
PHASIS, a new European Research Infrastructure Consortium
that is currently being set up.
Recommendation 7f: Switzerland should remain a member
of ELIXIR, the European network for integrating and sustain-
ing bioinformatics resources across its member states. Swit-
zerland should maintain its commitment to and participation
in this valuable and unique network.
Recommendation 7g: Switzerland should maintain strong
involvement in the Global Biodata Coalition, a forum for
research funders to share and coordinate approaches for
the efficient management and growth of biodata resources
worldwide, where Switzerland is strongly involved through
SIB and the State Secretariat for Education, Research and
Innovation (SERI).
Recommendation 7i: Switzerland should aspire to full mem-
bership in Euro-BioImaging. The proposed national infra-
structure SwissBioImaging would provide a distinct, spear-
heading and internationally visible body that would serve as
the Swiss node of Euro-BioImaging and thus provide crucial
international cooperation and exchange between Swiss re-
searchers and the European community.
3 Introduction
The present roadmap for future large research infrastruc- SCNAT has initiated the work to elaborate such disci-
tures represents the view of the Swiss scientific commu- pline-specific community roadmaps in the fields of biol-
nity in the field of biology. It is a formal element of the ogy, geosciences, chemistry, and in sub-fields of physics
process to elaborate the ‘Swiss Roadmap for Research In- in the last quarter of 2018. Its Board defined a process that
frastructures 2023’ according to Swiss law (art. 41 Federal provided for an overall strategic project lead and for com-
Act on the promotion of research and innovation; art. 55 of munity-specific sub-projects, all headed by acknowledged
the corresponding ordinance). The roadmap describes the researchers. The whole process was modelled in analogy
community needs in terms of national or international re- to the long-standing experience of SCNAT in the fields
search infrastructures for the funding period 2025–2028. of astronomy and physics, where roadmaps for research
It shall serve as an additional basis for the decision-mak- infrastructures had been elaborated in earlier years by the
ing on new or major upgrades of national infrastructures various communities, which were assembled for that pur-
and/or major participations in international network in- pose around a so-called ‘Round Table’. Accordingly, start-
frastructures and user facilities. ing in 2019, such Round Tables were also established in
biology, chemistry and geosciences. In the past two years,
The responsibility for the elaboration of the ‘Swiss hundreds of researchers were invited to take part in this
Roadmap for Research Infrastructures 2023’ rests with the process and dozens of them actively participated in each
State Secretariat for Education, Research and Innovation of the various Round Tables. Whereas this effort was run
(SERI). It has thus launched a process that includes (phase under the overall responsibility and guidance of SCNAT,
1) the selection of infrastructures by the ETH Board and including the provision of considerable scientific, edito-
swissuniversities, (phase 2) the evaluation by the Swiss rial and administrative manpower by its office, the final
National Science Foundation, and (phase 3) the assess- result must be considered a genuine bottom-up contribu-
ment of the feasibility again by the ETH Board and swis- tion by the various scientific communities.
suniversities. The result will be submitted to the Feder-
al Council for consideration and decision in the context The roadmap at hand expresses a vision for the future
of the Dispatch on Education, Research and Innovation development of biological research in Switzerland and
2025–2028. This whole process is complemented by a the infrastructure needs identified to realise this vision.
preparatory phase to establish the needs of the various Representatives of existing large research infrastructures,
scientific communities. The SERI has formally mandated specialised societies, all Swiss universities and the ETH
the Swiss Academy of Sciences (SCNAT) with the elabo- Domain, covering numerous sub-fields of biology, were
ration of these discipline-specific community roadmaps invited to participate in the Round Table Biology. In a first
to which the present one belongs. phase, 12 sub-groups were formed to collect the views of
many experts in specific areas of research. In a second
phase, the thus identified needs were consolidated into
four concrete proposals (see details in Appendix 1). These
proposals were also coordinated with the other commu-
nity roadmaps, especially the Geosciences Roadmap for
Research Infrastructures (ecology) and the Chemistry
Roadmap for Research Infrastructures (structural biolo-
gy). Finally, almost 200 scientists were invited to review
the present Biology Roadmap for Research Infrastructures.
4 Purpose and scope of this roadmap
The aim of this roadmap is to identify large infrastructures The technologies and infrastructures of the future consist
needed by the Swiss research community, as well as in- of networks and facilities that can be used by researchers
ternational initiatives that Switzerland should participate from multiple fields, addressing a wide range of scientific
in to keep biological research in Switzerland at the fore- questions and integrating results from multiple research
front of the field. The focus lies on research in biological, areas. Because diverse biological systems have fundamen-
ecological and non-clinical biomedical and nutritional re- tal similarities, newly developed technologies will serve a
search. It was decided at the outset of the elaboration of wide range of disciplines within biology and beyond. Re-
this document to exclude clinical biomedicine and thus searchers are now using tools that enable high-throughput
the specific requirements entailed by studies involving acquisition and the collection of information at all levels
human patients. However, there are strong links between of the hierarchy of biological organisation and across all
the sub-fields covered herein and translational research, biologically relevant spatial and temporal scales. The de-
including clinical applications, as biomedicine is at the velopment of powerful data capture and analysis tools;
interface of biology, medicine, mathematics and a few the standardisation of working protocols, data documen-
other natural sciences. It forms a branch of the medical tation and data storage; the efficient exchange of results;
sciences in which experimental knowledge is applied to and general accessibility of data and specimens are all
clinical practice in human health and diseases. At Swiss fundamental in enhancing the value of research output
academic institutions, as in other countries, biomedicine and accelerating further progress in research. New large-
is commonly integrated into the medical department. scale monitoring systems for ecological sites will make it
Links to biological departments are essential for biomed- possible to identify biological interactions and the influ-
icine, but play a supplementary role at the institutional ence of environmental factors on ecosystems. This new
level. Importantly, through the existing academic connec- knowledge will help to reduce the impact of human ac-
tions, researchers in biomedicine have access to the bi- tivities on services provided by intact ecosystems and re-
ological infrastructure, and to guidance in mathematical store ecosystem function.
programming and data analysis. In conclusion, biomedi-
cine relies on evidence-based experimental research and The roadmap provides detailed descriptions of four na-
will therefore benefit from the research infrastructures tional infrastructures that will serve the entire commu-
proposed herein through the synergies between different nity, encompassing the diverse organisational levels
disciplines of health-oriented research. of biology, from single molecules to entire ecosystems.
The infrastructures proposed herein will be open to all
researchers at Swiss universities, federal institutes of
technology and universities of applied sciences, as well
as those in the private sector. A general overview of bio-
logical research activities in several sub-fields is given in
Chapter 8 to highlight the context of the recommended
new research infrastructures. However, a comprehensive
summary of the research activities in the many fields of
excellence in the Swiss life sciences would be beyond the
scope of this roadmap.
5 Biology: the study of life
5.1 Biology and its organisational levels 5.2 The history of biology
Biology is defined as the study of life, ranging from uni- The origin of life and its diversification and function-
cellular organisms to humans. Biological research focuses ing have fascinated humankind throughout history. The
on the morphology and structure of organisms, their vital oldest records of biological studies (cave paintings, e.g.
processes, their origin, evolution and distribution, their at Kesselloch (SH) dated at approx. 15,000–11,000 B.C.)
behaviour, and their interactions among themselves and point towards the observation of organisms and their
with their environment. classification. Records from the Greco-Roman age reveal
a scientific interest in organisms and their parts. Medie-
The organisational levels of biology stretch from single val records point towards a focus on morphological in-
molecules and single units, such as DNA, proteins and vestigations of organisms, first by observation and later
metabolites, to cells, organisms, populations, communi- by dissection. A new organisational level was reached in
ties and complete ecosystems. Studies can be classified 1665, when Robert Hooke described cells for the first time.
according to the organisational levels considered. At the In the 19th century, cells were first suggested to be the
structural and biochemical level, the structure and func- fundamental units that all organisms are composed of, a
tion of single units (e.g. DNA, RNA, proteins and metab- proposition that remains central to cell theory to this day.
olites) and their context are studied. At the cellular level, Two more theories that emerged in the 19th century rev-
the behaviour and the development of cells, tissues and olutionised biology: the theory of evolution, proposed by
organs as a function of their sub-units are investigated. Charles Darwin, and Gregor Mendel’s principles of inher-
At the organism level, the whole organism is studied in itance, which provided the basis for modern genetics. In
terms of origin, function, development and behaviour. At the 20th and early 21st century, vast progress was made in
the multi-organism level, the composition, diversity and molecular and structural biology and genetic engineering,
behaviour of groups of organisms is of importance. It in- with the development of new concepts of cellular func-
cludes the study of biological interactions, population bi- tion. Moreover, substantial new insights were gained in
ology, evolutionary biology, community ecology and eco- animal and plant ecology, e.g. by the Swiss botanist Carl
system ecology. Evolutionary studies focus on the process Schröter, who introduced the concept of synecology to
through which different kinds of living organisms have describe the interactions between species occupying the
developed, from the scale of genome and population pro- same geographical area.
cesses to that of long-term dynamics, driving the transi-
tion to the current biota from earlier forms during the his-
tory of the Earth. Systematics deals with classifying living 5.3 The significance of technology
organisms, as well as establishing the evolutionary rela-
tionships among species. Ecology addresses the relation- Appropriate technologies and infrastructures are indis-
ship of organisms with their biotic and abiotic environ- pensable for ground-breaking discoveries in biology.
ment. Conservation biology addresses the protection and Throughout recorded history, the development of new
renaturation of Earth’s biodiversity. The common goals of technologies propelled biological research and was often
these last two disciplines are to protect species from ex- followed by milestones in discovery. The technologies
cessive rates of extinction and to prevent the erosion of essential for today’s research in biology can be roughly
biotic interactions, habitats and ecosystem functioning. divided into three groups: instruments and analytical de-
From the molecular to ecosystem level, biologists seek to vices, biotechnologies, and bioinformatics.
understand the mechanisms and processes that explain
the origin, growth, reproduction, structure, morphology, Instruments and analytical devices used in biological re-
physiology, anatomy, heredity, behaviour, distribution search often build on scientific discoveries made in other
and diversity of life on Earth. disciplines, namely physics and chemistry. Prominent ex-
amples of this group are imaging and spectroscopic devic-
es. Since the discovery of the telescope and microscope,
such devices have driven explosions in knowledge gain
and opened up new avenues of investigation. The obser-
vation of cells, for example, was a revolutionary discovery
made possible by the construction of light microscopes.
Today, various sub-fields of biology benefit from state-of-
the-art instruments used to investigate structures and pro- 5.4 Environmental and societal challenges ahead
cesses, from the molecular level to complex landscapes,
but also to test and measure environmental processes and Biological research is driven by the desire to find new
their relationships with organisms. While some devic- solutions to pressing environmental and societal chal-
es, like light microscopes, are accessible in many well- lenges. Most of the current global challenges are sum-
equipped laboratories, biologists continue to use and rely marised by the ‘One Health’ concept, coined to describe
on dedicated, multi-user facilities, such as synchrotrons the interconnectedness and interdependence of all living
for X-ray crystallography of sub-cellular components. species and the environment. Accordingly, understand-
ing and respecting this interdependence is key to solving
The second group, biotechnologies, builds on insights the major societal and environmental challenges we face
into biological processes. Important milestones in this today: climate change, biodiversity loss, sustainable food
respect include the elucidation of DNA structure and its production, and the health of humans and animals. One
replication, the development of the polymerase chain re- Health is advocated by international organisations like
action, Sanger sequencing and next-generation sequenc- the UN, WHO and G20, and is manifested in international
ing of DNA, and the discovery of the CRISPR/Cas9 com- agendas like the Sustainable Development Goals, which
plex and its role in DNA processing. These milestones target the health of humankind and a habitable planet
laid the foundation for genetic engineering, which has Earth.
become absolutely indispensable for modern biological
research. Biotechnologies are used to study biological sys- Today, major domains of biology are concerned with find-
tems, development, evolution and ecology, and they have ing solutions to One Health challenges: fundamental re-
revolutionised medical diagnostics and treatment. This search studies establish fundamental knowledge on the
remarkable impact of biological research and its benefit principles of life itself, thus revealing beneficial and det-
for humankind is reflected by the numerous Nobel Priz- rimental factors to the proliferation of all living beings.
es awarded to ground-breaking discoveries in biology. In Biomedical and nutritional science contribute to the im-
fact, since 2000, 13 Nobel Prizes in Chemistry and 16 No- provement of health and reduction of health risks, includ-
ble Prizes in Physiology or Medicine have been awarded ing emerging diseases and antibiotic resistance. Research
to biologists. on biodiversity, ecosystems, agriculture, forestry and cli-
mate adaptation is concerned with the health of all living
The third group, bioinformatics, combines insights into beings, and its aim is to provide the scientific foundation
biological systems with computational methods. Initial- for maintaining a sustainable world with functional eco-
ly driven by the exponential increase of sequencing and systems. One of the most pressing challenges today is to
other -omics data, computational methods have since reconcile various demands, namely the use of natural re-
found their way into just about every field of biology. Bi- sources to produce food, feed and fibre, with the conserva-
oinformatics facilitates data analysis on all structural lev- tion of functional ecosystems. In pursuit of the balanced,
els, from studies on single molecules to investigations of sustainable use of resources, researchers in ecology and
entire ecosystems and the evolution of species. Bioinfor- agriculture need to join forces today.
matics has progressed from an auxiliary science, applied
merely to develop tools for data analysis, to a critical area Research is an essential pillar on which solutions to these
of research in its own right. Today, complex simulations challenges must build. No single discipline will be able
modelling biological pathways or the functioning of en- to comprehend and resolve today’s global challenges. In-
tire cells combine information from numerous sources in stead, One Health highlights the need to overcome dis-
unprecedented ways to gain novel insights. Text and data ciplinary borders and move towards interdisciplinary
mining of millions of research publications play an in- and transdisciplinary research. Today, researchers al-
creasing role in the discovery of biochemical pathways ready integrate many sub-disciplines of biology, as well
and help experts predict gene functions. Through the new as physics, chemistry, computer science, engineering and
Swiss copyright law, Switzerland has a research location mathematics. Systems approaches are widespread in the
advantage for text and data mining, which will undoubt- analysis of organisms, the interaction between organisms,
edly lead to unprecedented discoveries. and their interactions with their abiotic environment.
Therefore, future findings in biology are expected to con-
tribute directly to solutions to the large societal and envi-
ronmental challenges ahead.
6 The current Swiss research landscape

and the international context
6.1 Biological research in Switzerland At the next higher scale, most of the biochemical, cell bio-
logical and developmental biology studies in Switzerland
Switzerland is at the forefront of international research are conducted in well-equipped wet laboratories or cen-
in biology. This status results from the contributions of tres at research institutions. To meet the ever-increasing
numerous highly specialised research groups covering a demand for imaging-based experimentation, most Swiss
broad range of topics on all organisational levels of biol- universities and research institutions have established
ogy, which in turn are supported by a continuous signif- advanced imaging facilities equipped with the latest elec-
icant central investment in research infrastructures, and tron and light microscopes, which can be used to perform
especially in state-of-the-art instruments. These research high-end image acquisition. While these facilities give
groups are generally well connected to their peers at access to instruments required for data-intensive -omics
Swiss and foreign institutions. Thus, the research agenda and imaging research, the capacities and capabilities for
is shaped by the diverse initiatives and research interests comprehensive data analysis present a bottleneck to many
within the biology community. The resulting diversity of research groups. This bottleneck is partially reduced by
approaches and topics covered, as well as the extensive the SIB Swiss Institute of Bioinformatics, which provides
expertise of researchers in Switzerland, are advantages of comprehensive bioinformatics services and resources
the decentralised organisation of the nation’s biological for life scientists and is highly regarded internationally.
research community. Furthermore, the Swiss National Supercomputing Cen-
tre (CSCS) develops and operates cutting-edge high-per-
The lines between the different fields of biology are in- formance computing systems as an essential service for
creasingly difficult to draw and boundaries between fun- Swiss researchers. These computing systems are used by
damental and applied research are fading, especially in scientists for a diverse range of purposes, from high-reso-
translational research. Consequently, interdisciplinary lution simulations to the analysis of complex data.
approaches and nationwide coordination are essential.
The National Centres of Competence in Research (NCCR) Research at the organism to multi-organism level depends
are beneficial platforms for knowledge exchange and re- on animal facilities, permanent plots and biological speci-
search coordination. Multiple NCCRs focus on life sci- mens, such as those stored in biobanks and held in natural
ence and biomedicine, including the NCCRs Chemical history collections. Several existing frameworks are high-
Biology, SYNAPSY, Kidney.CH, TransCure, Molecular ly important for environmental, ecological and evolution-
Systems Engineering, RNA & Disease, AntiResist and Mi- ary studies, including the Global Biodiversity Information
crobiomes. In a similarly interdisciplinary approach, the Facility (GBIF), InfoSpecies, SwissBOL, SwissFluxNet,
aim of the Blue Brain Project at EPFL is to reconstruct the the Swiss National Forest Inventory (NFI) and a number of
mouse brain digitally in great biological detail and to sim- sites for monitoring biodiversity and ecological processes.
ulate neuronal processes.
While the required instruments depend on the level of
The infrastructures required for biological research de- biological organisation being studied, all domains of bi-
pend on the level of biological organisation at which a ology have common needs: the skills and infrastructure
phenomenon is studied. Determining the structure of bi- to organise, share and store datasets and results; the ex-
omolecules generally involves highly specialised tech- pertise and capacity for data analysis; and procedures to
niques, such as X-ray diffraction, NMR spectroscopy and enable the reuse of research data and thus take part in the
cryo-electron microscopy. The highest spatial resolution open science endeavour. A series of developments and
of the investigated structures can be achieved using high prospective initiatives have emerged in response to the
brilliance radiation sources that are available at a limited challenge of digitalisation in various areas of biological
number of dedicated sites in Switzerland, for instance the research. For example, the Swiss Biobanking Platform
Swiss Light Source (SLS) at the Paul Scherrer Institute (SBP) coordinates human and non-human biobanks, al-
(PSI). A molecular resolution of biological structures is though it has limited funding compared with initiatives
also achieved by the Swiss Free Electron Laser (Swiss- in other countries and cannot maintain biobanking in-
FEL) and the Swiss Spallation Neutron Source (SINQ), frastructure or replace underfunded local management
both at PSI. of biobanks and their collections. The Swiss Network of
Natural History Collections (SwissCollNet), an initiative
started in 2019, will foster physical and digital access to
natural history collections. BioMedIT, taking place with- ly disseminated into all molecular biology laboratories of
in the framework of the Swiss Personalised Health Net- the member states. The EMBO fosters research in Europe
work (SPHN), is of high relevance to the biomedical sec- in two main ways. First, it provides platforms for inter-
tor and is expected to provide important solutions for the national information exchange (e.g. meetings) that attract
handling of clinical data. Some of the knowledge gained the world research elite. Second, it offers fellowships that
through this initiative could also be useful for future data fund the most promising young researchers at an early
management in biology. Moreover, artificial intelligence stage and encourage their long-term involvement in the
(AI) approaches such as deep learning are becoming wide- European research community. Organisations like EMBL
spread in biological investigations, and an Artificial Intel- and EMBO also spearhead, coordinate and contribute
ligence Center has recently been opened at ETH Zurich. to important international research infrastructures (e.g.
The Swiss Data Science Center (SDSC), a joint venture ELIXIR and Euro-BioImaging).
between EPFL and ETH Zurich, has the mission to accel-
erate the use of data science and machine learning tech- Concerning data management, Switzerland supported
niques within academic disciplines of the ETH Domain, the establishment of a European network called ELIXIR.
the Swiss academic community at large and the industrial ELIXIR unites Europe’s leading life science organisations
sector. In addition, SIB applies AI approaches in many of in managing and safeguarding the increasing volume of
its activities. data that is generated by publicly funded research. The
network coordinates, integrates and sustains bioinformat-
ics resources across its member states. Furthermore, it en-
6.2 International collaboration ables users in academia and industry to access services
that are vital for their research. SIB is the Swiss node of
Competitive research is not possible without international ELIXIR and the largest national node in the network. Many
networking and the ability to attract worldwide attention. SIB members play a very active role in ELIXIR and partici-
Throughout Europe, there is a trend to build networks be- pate in the activities coordinated by the ELIXIR platforms
tween hubs equipped with infrastructure and expert staff. and through the different ELIXIR Communities. For ex-
Within these networks, nodes are established to share ample, the ELIXIR Food & Nutrition Community, which is
data, common workflows are defined, and researchers currently being established, will catalyse the transition of
have open access to data. In Europe, such international classical nutritional research to -omics-based nutrigenom-
hubs usually have the legal form of European Research In- ics research. In this context, ELIXIR-Switzerland, i.e. SIB,
frastructure Consortia (ERIC), or as initiatives in their pre- will play a key role in supporting the development of
parative phases to become an ERIC. Switzerland, being at the Swiss nutritional research community. Switzerland,
the forefront of research in a vast range of disciplines, par- through SIB and SERI, is also strongly involved in the es-
ticipates in many of these European initiatives at different tablishment of the Global Biodata Coalition (GBC). The
levels. Some of the European initiatives achieve goals un- goal of GBC is to stabilise and ensure sustainable financial
attainable for individual states, such as the pan-Europe- support for the global biodata infrastructure. In particular,
an monitoring of greenhouse gases through the Integrated its aim is to identify – for prioritised long-term support – a
Carbon Observation System (ICOS), where Switzerland is set of global core data resources that are crucial for sus-
a full member. taining the broader biodata infrastructure.
Swiss participation in these European initiatives is gener- Some international research organisations provide their
ally seen as highly beneficial for Swiss researchers. Good member states with access to state-of-the-art user facili-
examples of how Swiss researchers benefit from interna- ties that are essential for certain sub-fields of biology. For
tional networking are the European Molecular Biology structural determination, for instance, Swiss researchers
Laboratory (EMBL) and the European Molecular Biology have access to the European Synchrotron Radiation Facil-
Organisation (EMBO), which have been founded and fi- ity (ESRF) in Grenoble, including the Swiss-Norwegian
nanced with Swiss participation. Together, the two or- Beamlines (SNBL), and to beamlines at the Deutsche Ele-
ganisations provide an internationally highly visible and ktronen Synchrotron (DESY) in Hamburg. These facilities
attractive hub of excellence in European molecular biol- complement the Swiss facilities at PSI. As detailed below,
ogy that reflects well on the research in all their member the Swiss research community demonstrates a keen inter-
states. The EMBL provides a unique research environ- est in the participation in further organisations.
ment that serves as a magnet for young, innovative scien-
tists. While these young talents help to spread the newest
technology and innovation to member states, they also of-
ten stimulate new technology developments themselves.
Consequently, such technology is optimally and efficient-
7 Vision for the future
Societal and environmental challenges have driven scien- New infrastructures for biological research should facil-
tific inquiries in the past and will continue to do so in the itate interdisciplinary approaches and capitalise on the
future. The general public expects academic research to broad expertise of the Swiss research community. This
contribute to rapid solutions for societal and environmen- need is met more adequately by (inter)national mul-
tal issues, such as contamination, the biodiversity crisis, ti-nodal networks rather than single-site core facilities.
climate change, antimicrobial resistance and emerging Owing to digital technologies, network infrastructures
diseases, as recently seen in the contexts of pesticide con- can facilitate access to biological samples, research data
tamination in agriculture and the SARS-CoV-2 outbreak. and expert knowledge. Accessible, interoperable data, as
In addition, stakeholders, including patients, consumers well as shared methods and knowledge on data analysis,
and farmers, want to be able to access research results to have been identified as common needs and essential re-
improve productivity and health. quirements to propel biological research in Switzerland.
High-throughput technologies, cloud computing and big
The complexity of these challenges is likely to reinforce data analytics will continue to dramatically accelerate
the trend towards interdisciplinary research within differ- discovery.
ent fields of biology and in synergy with other disciplines,
especially medicine, chemistry and geosciences. In bio- Technical progress cannot be accomplished without ac-
medicine, the lines between basic research, translational companying policy changes fostering open data. Critical
research and diagnostic/clinical practices have become to the success of any data network are changes to gov-
very difficult to draw, especially in disciplines like oncol- ernance and policies that impede data sharing and data
ogy, rare diseases and infectiology. Similarly, in systems contributions from the public, research and clinical com-
biology the boundaries between genomes, proteomes and munities. It is essential to build easy ways for researchers
metabolomes have dissolved in efforts to understand or- and citizens to contribute their data, whether directly or
ganismal processes and identify important modulators of through a third party.
key biological processes. Moreover, the provision of eco-
system services and mitigation of global climate change Moreover, artificial intelligence (AI) approaches such as
effects can only be realised if the interaction of natural deep learning have enormous potential in biological and
and managed ecosystems with environmental conditions biomedical research. Machine learning, and other types of
can be addressed. AI, need clean, structured, unbiased, high-quality train-
ing data to function, as well as appropriate ontologies.
Across all organisational levels the most apparent chal- Expert curation is essential for all these aims. Therefore,
lenge is the effective use of data through comprehensive it goes without saying that the development and imple-
analysis. To confront this challenge, increased national mentation of AI will best thrive when embedded in the
and international coordination is absolutely key. Such relevant research environments, close to and fuelled by
coordination would clearly make research more efficient the scientific applications it serves.
and open up new research opportunities and fruitful col-
laborations for individual research groups. In particular, The strength of AI lies in recognising patterns in data that
coordination with regard to the storage and open accessi- humans would not detect. AI approaches have proven to
bility of biological samples and data, as well as standard- be extremely adept in fields such as image analysis and
ised workflows for data acquisition, processing and com- protein structure prediction for two main reasons: first,
prehensive analysis, would be beneficial to researchers in there are strong correlations between individual data
all fields of biology. points (like pixels in an image or physical interactions
between residues); and second, there are vast amounts of
annotated training data for these applications (annotated
images and experimental protein structures and homolo-
gous sequences). It is yet to be seen whether AI approach-
es such as deep learning will have a similarly transforma-
tive effect on other areas of biological research.
8 Development of national infrastructures and Swiss participation

in international organisations (2025–2028)
Swiss researchers continuously push the frontier of

knowledge in all fields of biology, using and relying on
high-quality equipment and infrastructure. Consequent-
ly, access to state-of-the-art infrastructure on the national
and international level are key to maintaining the high 8.1 SwissBioCollection:
level of excellence in Swiss biological research. The pur- biobanks and natural history
pose of the present roadmap is to propose infrastructures collections
that will serve broad groups of researchers from various
fields of biology and related sciences. During the 18-month
consultation process leading to the present roadmap, four
8.1.1 Repositories of past, present and future
complementary national infrastructures for research in bi- scientific knowledge
ology were identified: SwissBioCollection is focused on Specimens of entire or fragmented organisms, organs,
building the technical infrastructure needed for the man- cells, single units and molecules are regularly used for
agement, curation and digitisation of natural history col- scientific investigations in the biological and medical
lections and biobanks holding specimens that form the fields, whereas in geosciences studies are performed on
basis for high-quality research in many fields of biology. specimens of rocks, minerals, fossils, soils and sediments.
SwissBioSites involves the establishment of a network of These specimens, generally curated in natural history
experimental sites to study and monitor natural and an- collections, contain the accurate and persistent informa-
thropogenic drivers of change in ecosystems. SwissBio- tion required to understand and manage natural systems.
Data is focused on facilitating the sharing, combination, Specimens also offer a window into the past, making it
analysis and standardisation of data from various sources possible to trace changes and patterns in ecology and
and fields of biology, in particular -omics data. SwissBio evolution back in time, thus providing base-line data for
Imaging is dedicated to bioimaging, which poses specif- robust science-based decisions in the future. Additional-
ic challenges in terms of unprecedented volumes of data, ly, samples such as organs, tissues, cell cultures, blood,
data richness and the lack of efficient, accessible tools for DNA, RNA, proteins, seeds and embryos are frequently
image analysis. stored in biobanks of research institutions and hospitals.
Processing and storing these samples often requires pre-
Common to all four infrastructures is the challenge of cisely defined and standardised conditions to ensure that
comprehensive data exploitation, which often constitutes the samples can be productively utilised for specific re-
a limiting bottleneck. Coordination between research search experiments.
groups is required regarding standardised workflows to
produce interoperable experimental datasets, consistent Collected organisms may represent taxa that are new to
data processing, and efficient, sufficiently specialised science or additional samples of known species, which
tools for data analysis. Ideally, the configuration and set- provide information on natural variability. They also en-
up of instrumentation should go hand-in-hand with the capsulate several layers of metadata and carry a large po-
development of data analysis procedures that match both tential for associated studies on pathogens, macromole-
data acquisition schemes and data exploitation goals. cules and metabolic compounds. Consequently, they are
Coordinated data management should lead to interoper- gaining importance in various areas of research, including
able research datasets while still respecting the specific biology, biotechnology, environmental and agricultural
requirements of the numerous specialised sub-fields of studies, and medical and veterinary sciences. They are
biology. Therefore, in spite of the presence of somewhat crucial for answering fundamental scientific questions
related challenges in several fields of biology, four sep- about ecological, evolutionary and geological process-
arate, dedicated network infrastructures are proposed to es. Data derived from Swiss and European natural his-
keep Switzerland at the forefront of international research tory collections underpin countless discoveries and in-
in biology. novations, including scholarly publications and official
reports that support legislative and regulatory processes
Moreover, membership and participation in several inter- on land use, societal infrastructure, health, food securi-
national research organisations and initiatives is recom- ty, biodiversity loss, sustainability and environmental
mended. A non-exhaustive list summarising these initia- change. Natural history collections are also at the heart of
tives is given in Appendix 2. databases, maps and descriptions of scientific objects and
observations, and they are a resource for education and

knowledge dissemination to the general public.
Biological material stored in biobanks and the corre-

sponding data are considered the essential raw material
for the advancement of many fields, such as evolutionary
research, genetics, biochemistry, microbiology and pre-
cision medicine. Biobanks facilitate the reception, regis-
tration, processing, storage and shipping of potentially
sensitive and valuable specimens to researchers for use
in diverse scientific experiments. Biobanking practice
has greatly evolved over the last years, from the individ-
ual collection of biological material towards profession-
al infrastructures addressing technical, ethical, legal and
quality issues, as well as access and benefit-sharing pol-
icies. However, more complex samples, such as soil and
microbiota samples, are also coming into the focus, re-
quiring very different types of infrastructure, knowledge
and quality elements.
Despite its small size, Switzerland holds over 60 million

specimens in its natural history collections, assembled
Dog blood samples intended for genetic research
over the last two centuries, and more than 10 million (photo Vetsuisse Biobank, University of Bern)
non-human specimens in biobanks. Swiss natural histo-
ry collections and biobanks are therefore a pivotal infra-
structure for meeting the most important challenge the
global community will face over the next decades: map- institutions, mainly at the research group level in univer-
ping a sustainable and healthy future and supporting the sities and other public and private research institutions.
natural systems upon which we depend.
Despite the pivotal function of biological and geological
In contrast to the situation in many non-federal countries, specimens for current and future research, Switzerland
Swiss natural history collections and biobanks are not is far behind in making these specimens available to the
concentrated in a national institution but are decentral- international scientific community and will need to in-
ised and located across the cantons. Natural history col- vest substantial funds in this area in the coming years
lections are stored, curated and managed in museums, bo- in order to keep up with international scientific devel-
tanical gardens, zoos, universities and institutions of the opments. Currently, only a small percentage (17%) of
ETH Domain. Similarly, biobanks are curated at multiple specimens in natural history collections held in Switzer-
land are digitally available, and some collections require
re-determination according to modern taxonomic con-
cepts. Acknowledging the scientific potential of natural
history collections, the Swiss Academy of Sciences – to-
gether with a group of experts – has identified measures
to valorise natural history collections and to make them
accessible for research. Furthermore, the Academies of
Arts and Sciences have proposed the establishment of a
national research infrastructure, the Swiss Natural His-
tory Collection Network (SwissCollNet), for the planning
period 2021–2024. Likewise, SwissCollNet, in close col-
laboration with the Swiss institutions hosting collections,
is currently elaborating a National Natural History Col-
lections Strategy for 2021–2031, resulting from extensive
roundtable discussions in the framework of the current
Biology Roadmap.
Collection of snail (ex coll. Shuttleworth) shells at the Natural History
Museum in Bern (photo Estée Bochud)
Digitisation room set up in the frame of an international initiative aiming to digitise all type specimens stored in worldwide herbaria
(photo Conservatory and Botanic Gardens of Geneva)
In the European Union, the importance of digital unifi- specialists and institutions and supported by the Federal
cation of natural science assets was recognised through Office for the Environment (FOEN). Some Swiss biobanks
the creation of the Distributed System of Scientific Col- are situated at the interface of biology and medicine. For
lections (DiSSCo) in 2018. This initiative is part of the instance, microbial culture collections are of growing
European Strategy Forum on Research Infrastructures importance in the context of microbiome and biodiver-
(ESFRI) roadmap and is currently being established be- sity research, as reflected in international efforts like the
tween partner nations and participating institutions. global Microbiota Vault initiative, which includes plans
Swiss scientists have been involved in designing data pol- for biobanking in Switzerland. Human and non-human
icies and, together with Zenodo, exploring ways to store biobanking in Switzerland is coordinated by the Swiss
the vast number of digital copies of specimens for DiSS- Biobanking Platform (SBP), an initiative of the Swiss Na-
Co repositories. Switzerland has not yet joined DiSSCo, tional Science Foundation (SNSF), which responds to the
although single experts are actively participating in its increasing needs of biomedical researchers in terms of
development through other professional channels, such quality, access, transparency and interconnectedness of
as membership in the Consortium of European Taxonom- biobanks and associated data. SBP centralises information
ic Facilities (CETAF), with the aim that Switzerland will on human and non-human biobanks, each established to
join DiSSCo in the near future. BiCIKL, a new EU-funded address specific scientific questions, and ensures broad
research infrastructure based on ELIXIR, DiSSCo, Biodi- access to these biobanks for research purposes. It is build-
versity Literature Repository and Catalogue of Life, will ing a register of biobanks in Switzerland, which currently
help to link -omics, specimen and literature-based data, comprises predominantly medically oriented human bio-
and it will provide tools to enhance access across these banks. SBP provides technical know-how and support for
domains. biobanking and IT management, provides counselling on
legal and ethical aspects, and helps to ensure high quality
Biobanking activities in Switzerland support a broad and interoperability in biobanking. However, many exist-
spectrum of research disciplines, ranging from purely ing biobanks, especially those outside the purely medical
medical research in hospitals to clearly biologically mo- field, still operate with heterogeneous processes and are
tivated initiatives. As an example of the latter, the Swiss not registered, or even recognised by the scientific com-
Barcode of Life (SwissBOL) is an initiative to inventory munity in some cases, making it difficult for researchers
genetic data on Swiss biodiversity, built on a network of to access their samples.
At the international level, a European initiative called

the Biobanking and Biomolecular Resources Research
Infrastructure (BBMRI-ERIC) is in place to bring togeth-
er all main players in the biobanking field, with the aim
of developing a pan-European distributed research infra-
structure in order to facilitate access to high-quality (bi-
ological) resources and facilities for biomolecular and
biomedical research purposes. Switzerland holds an ob-
server status at BBMRI and is represented by SBP as the
Swiss national node. SBP ensures the harmonisation of
biobanking practices with international and EU standards
and provides the Swiss research community with infor-
mation on biobanking networks abroad and international
biobanking-related activities.
Trimming of formalin-fixed animal tissues for long-term preservation
using paraffin-embedding (photo Conrad von Schubert)
The importance of natural history collections and biobanks
is expected to increase dramatically in the future. Novel
methods will make natural history collections even more different fields of biobanking will ultimately benefit the
available and valuable for cutting-edge scientific research entire Swiss research landscape. Major effort will be re-
(e.g. DNA analyses of historical specimens). High-quality quired to internationally harmonise biobanking standards
digitising technologies are becoming available for small and to facilitate new accessions with modern research
specimens (insects), and mass digitising technologies are foci and the exchange of samples and data. The breadth
available to digitise entire collections with millions of of biobanking requires a carefully coordinated funding
specimens. Given the decentralised organisation of nat- policy to adequately support Swiss scientists from dif-
ural history collections, there is an urgent need to build ferent disciplines, ranging from fundamental science to,
a Swiss Virtual Natural History Collection that connects for instance, clinical medicine. While clinical biobanks
decentralised collections, provides open access to all dig- are currently evolving quickly, comparable support and
itally available information across the Swiss collections, infrastructures for non-human biobanking are currently
and links Swiss natural history collections in a Europe- lacking. In publishing future research results, scientists
an and international context. In addition, countries at the should follow best practice, including publishing data
forefront of biological research must have high-quality following FAIR (Findable, Accessible, Interoperable and
biobanks with well documented specimens that require Reusable) standards and indicating taxonomic names and
storage conditions other than those available in natural accession or specimen codes linked with persistent iden-
history collections. An intense exchange of knowledge in tifiers. Switzerland should make use of the expertise in
scholarly publishing provided through the BiCIKL con-
sortium and, based on this expertise, play an important
part in this development.
8.1.2 Proposed developments
Today, it is considered vital to provide and ensure access

to all specimens and associated metadata in natural his-
tory collections and biobanks and to follow standardised
conservation and archiving policies. Furthermore, genetic
and other metadata associated with physical specimens
should be valorised. The curation of physical specimens
as a potential source of genetic data is of particular impor-
tance for research on evolution and the temporal develop-
ment of biodiversity. Despite the efforts of the Swiss node
of the Global Biodiversity Information Facility (GBIF)
to synthesise all data and metadata from natural history
collections, we are still facing a situation in which the
Collection of leaf beetles held at the Naturmuseum Solothurn existing samples are generally managed individually by
(photo Nicole Hänni, Naturmuseum Solothurn)
the host institutions, in a systematic or project-oriented natural history collections and non-human biobanks,
manner. as well as access to unpublished data and data liberated
from scientific publications.
With the SwissBioCollection initiative, Switzerland will – Follow open science policy to publish research results
build an infrastructure that will serve the needs of Swiss- in a format that includes specific annotations to include
CollNet, InfoSpecies and GBIF, but also SBP and impor- and link the data with the specimens in the collections
tant non-human biobanks that are required for biological, or biobanks (FAIR data).
biotechnological, environmental, agricultural and veter- – Promote the scientific and educational use of Swiss nat-
inary research. It will be constructed as a decentralised ural history collections and biobanks nationally and in-
Swiss infrastructure. Facilities holding collections will ternationally, and encourage the training needed for the
be required to follow common technical standards and array of taxonomic, systematic and technical jobs relat-
the system will evolve into one integrated and highly in- ed to natural history collections and biobanks.
terconnected national infrastructure. Through this pro-
cess, the collections will become more efficient in terms
of sample management and storage, as well as access to
published data about samples, which in turn will facili-
tate rapid responses to requests for access to samples for
scientific research. These standards for natural history
collections will be in accordance with the recommenda-
tions of DiSSCo, the global Biodiversity Data Standards
Group (TWDG) and GBIF. Similarly, the standardisation
of medically oriented and non-human biodiversity bio-
banks will follow the recommendations of BBMRI and
the Global Genome Biodiversity Network (GGBN), respec-
tively. Interactions with BBMRI will be handled via the
national node SBP, to ensure coordination with clinical
biobanking and to avoid redundancies. Furthermore, the
preservation of genetic samples should be in agreement
with the strategy of initiatives like GGBN and SwissBOL,
which aim to ensure the continuity of the genetic refer-
encing of species in Switzerland as part of national bio-
Imaging station to digitise entomological collections at ETH Zurich
diversity monitoring programmes. The Earth Biogenome (photo Pierre Kellenberger, ETH Bibliothek)
Project and its European node, the European Reference
Genome Atlas (ERGA), plan to generate reference genome
sequences of all eukaryotic species on the planet. Swiss-
BioCollection will form an essential prerequisite to reach
these visionary goals.
In summary, SwissBioCollection will:

– Promote the storage, management and curation of his-
torical, recent and future samples and specimens with-
in natural history collections and biobanks in Switzer-
land. To achieve this goal, sustainable funding will be
required for physical infrastructures, such as storage
facilities and automated devices for specimen or sam-
ple intake, processing, retrieval and distribution.
– Enable and unify physical and digital access to speci-
mens and to biodiversity and geodiversity information.
To this end, specimen information will need to be dig-
itised, mobilised and published, following the stand-
ards used by the GBIF.
– Provide new, linked and open access to data associated
with collections in a Swiss Virtual Natural History Col-
lection of biological and geodiversity specimens, as Collection of animal tissue slides for morphologic microscopic analyses
part of a decentralised research infrastructure for Swiss (photo Conrad von Schubert)
Collection of vertebrate skeletons at the Natural History Museum in Fribourg (photo michaelmaillard.com)
– Integrate Swiss natural history collections and bio- er fields profit from these biological archives. For example,
banks into international efforts to mobilise biodiversity research based on biobanks is done in close collaboration
and geodiversity data in a coordinated way, with the with Swiss breeding organisations. In general, samples and
aim to benefit Swiss research and international collab- data are exchanged between industry and academic re-
orations. To reach this goal, it is important that Switzer- searchers. Georeferenced biodiversity and geodiversity data
land develops strong national nodes within the Europe- play a pivotal role in applied research and in administra-
an initiatives DiSSCo, BBMRI and GGBN. tion at the federal, cantonal and municipal levels. It informs
politics and public administration, i.e. the Federal Office
Effectively, the creation of a nationally recognised, dis- for Agriculture (FOAG), the Federal Office for the Environ-
tributed infrastructure for natural history collections and ment (FOEN) and the Federal Food Safety and Veterinary
biobanks will promote the unification of all Swiss natu- Office (FSVO). Research enabled by high-quality biobank-
ral science assets under common policies and practices ing supports almost all global Sustainable Development
that aim to make the data openly available to scientists in Goals (SDGs 1, 2, 3, 4, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15 and 17).
accordance with the FAIR open data policies. The trans-
formation of the currently fragmented and heterogene- In addition, Swiss institutions hosting natural history
ous landscape of the crucial natural history collections collections are strongly involved in education within the
and biobanks in Switzerland into a coordinated research ETH Domain and at universities and universities of ap-
infrastructure will facilitate scientific excellence by pro- plied sciences. Swiss museums, botanical gardens and
viding interconnected empirical evidence on the natural zoos host exhibitions, offering a supporting framework
world. This in turn will open up the Swiss natural his- for the broader society and for courses in organismic bi-
tory collections and biobanks, and their associated data, ology at universities. Biobanking of samples from pri-
to scientists both nationally and internationally, facilitat- vately owned domestic animals enables and encourages
ing Swiss participation in sister-initiatives in Europe that a strong element of citizen science. The involvement of
have already recognised the importance of these biologi- motivated breeders and owners and the utilisation of ex-
cal archives for science. perience-based knowledge is an integral part of this kind
of research.
Knowledge stored in and gained from natural history col-
lections and biobanks will benefit the public sector and
private industry in many ways. Ecosystem management,
agriculture, sustainable development, biodiversity conser-
vation, disease control and environmental monitoring, but
also medical applications, civil engineering and many oth-
structures that were established as larger-scale and longer-

term experiments, e.g. agricultural trials of different crop
varieties or management methods, research afforestation,
and experiments addressing effects of environmental or
biotic manipulation on biodiversity and ecosystem pro-
cesses. The commonality between all of these infrastruc-
8.2 SwissBioSites tures is that the biological parameters of organisms, pop-
ulations and communities are measured. Depending on
8.2.1 Long-term and large-scale investigations the research question, this involves analysis of the eco-
of natural and managed ecosystems physiology and phenotype of organisms, the interactions
between organisms, or various aspects of biodiversity and
Dedicated sites for research and sampling serve as starting ecosystem function. The overlapping interest consists of:
points for biological research endeavours, especially in (a) addressing the drivers and consequences of changes in
the fields of ecology, agriculture and forestry. The global terrestrial and aquatic ecosystems, including effects of cli-
scope of modern research in these fields and of many of mate change; and (b) providing recommendations on ways
the toughest challenges we face today necessitates knowl- to manage, renature or protect ecosystems in the most sus-
edge of patterns and processes at large spatial and tem- tainable manner. Methodologically, these infrastructures
poral scales. Nonetheless, most research activities are involve analyses of the genome, transcriptome, metabo-
still undertaken at small spatial scales and in short-term lome, proteome and phenome of organisms, together with
projects, which are scattered among institutions, depart- measures of the composition, diversity and performance
ments and individual researchers. In recent decades there of populations, communities and ecosystems, and meas-
were some efforts to undertake large-scale and long-term ures of multiple environmental covariates (e.g. tempera-
research in these fields, and it was realised that such re- ture, soil moisture and pollutants). The nature of these
search requires adequate infrastructures. analyses leads to strong synergies through in-depth co-
operation with the field of geosciences and with the in-
Currently, there are essentially two types of infrastructure frastructure SwissBioCollection. Specific equipment used
relevant to these fields. On the one hand, there are infra- in analytical chemistry and gas exchange analysis, phe-
structures that were established as systems of permanent notyping devices such as cameras and unmanned aerial
plots, used in comparative studies of differences between vehicles, and environmental sensors are all used on site
ecosystems, e.g. between managed and unmanaged forests, and are provided and managed by the individual insti-
between differently managed agricultural fields, between tutions operating the experiments. The current manifold
different types of grasslands, or between nature reserves activities and infrastructures, with their specific research
and unprotected land. On the other hand, there are infra- questions and designs, need to be continued. Beyond that,
Unmanned aerial vehicle carrying colour and thermography cameras to assess height and temperature of wheat breeding plots
(photo Norbert Kirchgessner, ETH Zurich)
A flowering meadow in Engadin, Switzerland (photo Gabriela Brändle, Agroscope)
however, they need to be extended and complemented to (ICOS) network of such installations. Here, further partners
enable the comprehensive synergies and interdisciplinary monitor meteorology and multiple forest-related parame-
networking needed to address many advanced questions. ters, such as tree diameter, leaf area index and biomass.
This requires access to experimental sites and permanent
plots and to state-of-the-art methods and central support These last parameters in particular make ICOS and the
staff experienced in the multiple facets of experimenta- Swiss FluxNet an important asset for forestry in Switzer-
tion, from experimental design, to comparative observa- land. The current state and changes to the Swiss forest
tion, to data analysis and interpretation. It also requires are recorded in the Swiss National Forest Inventory (NFI).
‘nudging’ (motivating, incentivising) to encourage collab- The NFI contains data obtained through a systematic sam-
orations between researchers from different communities, pling inventory and enquiries at the local forest services.
such as ecology, forestry, and livestock and plant breed- The NFI is compiled by the Swiss Federal Institute for
ing. Close coordination of such efforts with work under- Forest, Snow and Landscape Research (WSL) in collab-
taken in the infrastructures SwissBioData and SwissBi- oration with the Forest Division of the Federal Office for
oImaging is required as well. Nonetheless, the specific the Environment (FOEN). Moreover, WSL conducts Long-
challenges of data collection and monitoring in the field term Forest Ecosystem Research (LWF) to examine the ef-
demand an independent SwissBioSites infrastructure fects of air pollution and climate change on forests, bridg-
serving the needs of multiple large research communities. ing the fields of biology and geosciences.
For research in biodiversity and ecology, the Swiss Flux- Other biodiversity and ecology monitoring sites with in-
Net is among the most important infrastructures in Swit- frastructure in place include Calanda (University of Basel,
zerland. The Swiss FluxNet comprises seven long-term University of Zurich, ETH Zurich), Lavey (Universities of
ecosystem sites coordinated by ETH Zurich, where the ex- Lausanne and Neuchâtel), a permanent plot network con-
change of CO2 and H2O (partly also N2O and CH4) between serving historical data on permanent plots (University of
vegetation (grassland, crops, forests) and the atmosphere Lausanne), Rechalp (University of Lausanne, ETH Zu-
is analysed via eddy-covariance flux measurements. Phys- rich), AlpFor (University of Basel), Schynige Platte (Uni-
iological parameters of the vegetation are also measured versity of Bern) and long-term forest sites (WSL). Moni-
at some sites (e.g. phenology, sap flow and biomass). One toring without specific infrastructure is done by various
of the Swiss FluxNet sites, situated in Davos, is embed- universities and local research networks in sites such as
ded in the European Integrated Carbon Observation System the Alpine Biology Centre and the Swiss National Park,
but also in the context of the Swiss Biodiversity Moni- been in operation since 2015 to develop imaging-based
toring programme driven by the FOEN (involving InfoS- monitoring methods. Parameters of soil, meteorology and
pecies, Agroscope and others). Other important nation- crop physiology have been monitored, and RGB, mul-
al structures are, for instance, the Swiss Soil Monitoring ti-spectral and thermal imaging procedures have been
Network (NABO) and the Blue-Green Biodiversity (BGB) developed that are partly operated from drones and now
research initiative of WSL and Eawag. used in other sites as well.
For agricultural research, Agroscope, the Swiss centre of In conclusion, Swiss universities, as well as federal and
excellence for agricultural research, operates multiple cantonal research institutions, have established a varie-
long-term experimental sites for various grassland systems ty of separate comparative and experimental facilities to
and for arable and horticultural crops located throughout address causes and consequences of changes in natural
the country. Nutrient management, plant protection, va- and managed ecosystems. Many of these facilities are
riety testing and the registration of physiological crop pa- maintained and used by several research groups and in-
rameters and of yield are done in parallel to agro-meteor- stitutions. Nonetheless, the existing infrastructures are
ological observations, modelling and breeding activities. scattered and limited in scope, scale and observable time
At the DOK site in Therwil, Agroscope – together with the period. Nationwide coordination and streamlining would
Research Institute of Organic Agriculture (FiBL) – has per- advance research in biodiversity, ecology, agriculture and
formed a comparison between different arable crop man- forestry tremendously.
agement systems (e.g. organic versus conventional) since
1978. In addition, Agroscope runs Protected Site, a na- The existing Swiss infrastructures and research approach-
tional research infrastructure to conduct field trials with es are also well aligned with international approaches,
genetically modified plants (GMPs). This highly regulated such as EMPHASIS and LifeWatch ERIC. EMPHASIS is an
experimental research site makes it possible to investigate ESFRI-listed European project that enables researchers to
the benefits and risks of GMPs and how these plants be- use facilities, resources and services for plant phenotyp-
have in the environment in the long term. ing across Europe. Switzerland recently signed a letter of
intent to support further joint activities, such as creating
Crop performance is also studied within the framework of a joint legal entity. This will mainly facilitate joint agri-
the field phenotyping platform of ETH Zurich, which has cultural experiments, but also the creation of jointly used
Eddy Flux tower on the experimental site Chamau of ETH Zurich (photo Group of Grasland Sciences, ETH Zurich)
Rapeseed field and field phenotyping station of ETH plant research station in Lindau-Eschikon (photo Urs Brändle, ETH Zurich)
data standards and measurement protocols and intense global change-related and sustainability-related questions
exchange of ideas and researchers. A further refinement can only be realised if organisms, their communities and
of the Swiss facilities for agricultural research, embedded the interaction of natural and managed ecosystems with
in the SwissBioSites infrastructure, would strengthen the the environment are considered together. This requires in-
role of Switzerland in this development. LifeWatch ERIC terwoven research communities that take the interaction
is a European Infrastructure Consortium providing e-sci- between natural and managed ecosystems into account.
ence research facilities to scientists seeking to deepen the Switzerland, as a densely-populated country with natural
understanding of biodiversity organisation and ecosystem and managed ecosystems of a widely varying nature locat-
functions and services in order to support civil society in ed in close proximity to each other and with an excellent
addressing key planetary challenges. LifeWatch ERIC was research and educational landscape, is an ideal model lab-
established as a European Research Infrastructure Consor- oratory for the world. Due to its topology and vast number
tium by the European Commission Implementing Deci- of natural water bodies, Switzerland can serve as a model
sion (EU) 2017/499 of 17 March 2017. to study both terrestrial as well as aquatic ecosystems. The
purpose of such a laboratory is to determine ways to ef-
Internationally, the call for integrated research and re- fectively conserve and restore biodiversity in the interest
search infrastructures has become more prominent. Swit- of human well-being, while at the same time allowing the
zerland, with its large geographical, biological and cul- use of natural resources in an efficient and sustainable
tural diversity at a small geographic scale, with its rich manner. In addition, plots monitored over long periods,
agricultural and forestry tradition, and with its high den- especially in terrestrial and aquatic natural sites, could
sity of excellent institutions and researchers, is in an become focal sites for discovering yet unknown biodiver-
outstanding position to become a model case for an in- sity, especially in biota such as nematodes, arthropods,
tegrated network of biology-oriented infrastructures. The protists and prokaryotes. These might encompass genes
planned infrastructures will complement national earth or lineages that are only found in Switzerland. Once de-
science infrastructures, as well as international networks scribed (e.g. through the network of natural history col-
of biology-oriented infrastructures. lections) and studied (e.g. with field and laboratory phe-
notyping, as well as genome analysis methods), an overall
framework could be developed in terms of the exploita-
8.2.1 Proposed developments tion of genetic resources and conservation. This shows
how SwissBioSites forms an important bridge between
The full potential of research in biodiversity, ecology, ag- the infrastructures SwissBioCollection, SwissBio Data
riculture and forestry to address fundamental, as well as and SwissBioImaging.
Therefore, a shared nationwide infrastructure of perma- the full diversity of natural and managed terrestrial and
nent plots, long-term experiments, and data acquisition aquatic ecosystems in Switzerland. This plot network will
and management is to be established to support lasting na- make it possible to quantify the drivers of change (e.g. in
tionwide functional biodiversity and ecosystem research land use and climate) and the diversity and performance
and to link environmental observations to socio-econom- of populations, communities and ecosystems, and to as-
ic information on drivers and consequences of change. sess the services these ecosystems provide to humans.
The currently existing infrastructure needs to be comple- Moreover, the research plot network and the sites of the
mented by a central hub and by a permanent plot system central hub will serve as the interface to efforts in inte-
to improve synergies. Moreover, this infrastructure will grated geosciences, complementing the infrastructures
be aligned with the proposed infrastructure in integrated proposed in the Geoscience Roadmap. Geo-referenced in-
geosciences. formation obtained through SwissBioSites will be linked
with geo-referenced information from remote sensing,
The central hub of SwissBioSites, which will be located climate measurements and models, as well as with spe-
at one of the existing sites, will facilitate experiments in cies and habitat information provided through SwissBio-
the interest of all related scientific communities. There, Collection. Further geographic and socio-economic infor-
ecologists, agricultural scientists and researchers from re- mation (e.g. on policies, regulations, and economic and
lated disciplines will collaborate experimentally. Their social incentives) provided by cantonal or federal offic-
mission will be to stimulate all related research fields by es will be considered as covariates in analyses in order
strengthening networking in the biology community and to draw comprehensive conclusions on further effects
by providing advice as to which new experiments and bi- of global change and to help inform decision-makers on
odiversity monitoring campaigns should be set up. These sustainability options. This will result in a data reservoir
researchers will need to have an excellent overview of the with enormous power to model drivers and scenarios of
Swiss and international research landscape, and they will change in multiple domains, while also opening the door
require access to state-of-the-art research infrastructures, for further collaborations with the basic research efforts to
such as analytical, physiological and remote-sensing de- be performed through the SwissBioData and SwissBioIm-
vices. aging infrastructures.
This central hub will be the prime location for special- Relationships between research and the private busi-
ised environmental data analysis and processing. These ness sector are well developed in agriculture and forest-
aspects of research come with their own intrinsic chal- ry. Based on these relationships and on the integrative
lenges, as the complexities of the environment as a system design of SwissBioSites, research conducted within the
mean that multiple organisms and environmental covar- framework of this infrastructure will undoubtedly bene-
iates need to be considered in analysis. The hub should fit society by enhancing sustainability, biodiversity and
provide analytical devices (to process samples taken from ecosystem services for society at large. SwissBioSites will
different sites, e.g. for genome and metabolome analyses) provide new opportunities for integrated education at
and imaging devices (mobile platforms, such as drones, all levels and for all relevant Swiss institutions. Further-
equipped with state-of-the art sensors and cameras) and, more, the causes and consequences of changes in natural
most importantly, should employ well-trained staff who and managed ecosystems are highly societally relevant in
can operate these installations and who can teach students the context of the global Sustainable Development Goals,
and Swiss researchers how to operate similar devices on the Swiss Biodiversity Strategy and related cantonal strat-
their sites. In addition, data scientists, algorithms and egies.
hardware will be required at the hub to analyse and model
environmental and organismic data from the genomic lev- Internationally, SwissBioSites will guarantee the promi-
el (bioinformatics) to the ecosystem level. Analyses will nent role of Switzerland in existing networks for biodiver-
need to include deep-learning routines to elucidate the sity monitoring and environmental, agricultural and for-
presence, performance and effect of organisms, as well as estry research. Networks, projects and activities, such as
species composition and abundance in natural and man- ICOS, EMPHASIS and LifeWatch ERIC, will profit enor-
aged ecosystems. By fulfilling these functions, the central mously from SwissBioSites, further promoting the lead-
facility will be a globally unique hub for experimental and ing role of Swiss biological research in the international
data science that provides a suite of services in ecology, context.
agriculture and forestry.
The sites of this highly instrumented hub will be com-

plemented by a network of research plots and facilities
distributed across the country, which together represent
institutions and research centres. Several of these core fa-

cilities are affiliated with SIB. These local core facilities
typically specialise in specific analysis techniques or data
types, for which there is a considerable local need. Staff at
these facilities work closely with local scientists, and in
some cases the facilities are maintained directly by groups
8.3 SwissBioData at research institutes and universities. The knowledge ex-
change that occurs through these collaborations and ar-
8.3.1 Enabling and fostering data-driven rangements adds substantial value to (ongoing) research
discoveries projects.
The ongoing revolution in biology has been driven by Currently, the affiliation of local bioinformatics core facil-
-omics techniques. Towards the turn of the millennium, ities with SIB facilitates collaboration in specific projects
the development of more efficient sequencing and -omics and/or the ad hoc exchange of best practices. However,
techniques gave rise to an exponential increase of data, since SIB’s current focus is on databases and software
leading to the current revolution in biological sciences. tools, as well as on personalised health, the support that
Switzerland is currently at the forefront in the develop- SIB can currently offer to the local core facilities is min-
ment of -omics techniques. The outstanding interdiscipli- imal due to financial constraints. Furthermore, the focus
nary Swiss research community, in combination with ex- so far has mostly been on local expansion to meet local
cellent base funding and third-party collaborations, have needs, rather than the creation of an inclusive network
led to the establishment of -omics core facilities (wet lab- that fosters integration and synergies.
oratories) at many Swiss universities, including univer-
sities of applied sciences, as well as research institutes. Integrative data sharing is important to generate value
These platforms specialise in generating high-quality da- from large biological datasets. Efficient approaches to
tasets that describe living systems at the molecular, cellu- standardise workflows and share large biological data-
lar and organismal level, along with interactions between sets, including -omics data, are of central importance to
organisms in the context of molecular and chemical ecolo- exploit these datasets and maximise their value. In the
gy. Advanced analysis techniques now typically integrate past, several initiatives within Switzerland have illustrat-
different types of data and, consequently, knowledge from ed this point.
these large datasets.
The Swiss Pathogen Surveillance Platform (SPSP) was
The need to harness large datasets for biology has led to established in the context of the National Research Pro-
the establishment of a rich community of local and nation- gramme 72 (NRP72) on Antimicrobial Resistance, through
al bioinformatics infrastructures. In 1998, the SIB Swiss a close collaboration between the University Hospitals of
Institute for Bioinformatics was set up as a non-profit re- Basel, Lausanne and Geneva, as well as VetSuisse, the
search infrastructure, embedded in and serving all major University of Basel and SIB. This secure One Health on-
academic hubs in Switzerland. SIB entertains partner- line platform enables near real-time sharing (under con-
ships and collaborations with leading national and inter- trolled access) of pathogen whole-genome sequences
national research institutions. SIB also has internal service and their associated clinical/epidemiological metadata.
groups whose data scientists provide essential databases It serves as a shared surveillance platform between hu-
and software platforms, data management services, in- man and veterinary medicine, including environmental
depth know-how in computational biology and software and food isolates, thereby enabling detailed transmission
engineering, and training in bioinformatics to life science and outbreak surveillance of pathogens in near real-time,
researchers. SIB’s activities help to keep Switzerland at with actionable results for public health. It also serves as
the forefront in the development of innovative techniques a repository of structured, standardised and well-anno-
to support biological research. Although Switzerland has tated data that can be used to answer specific research
built a rich network of bioinformatics and -omics facili- questions.
ties, this network does not reach all biologists in Switzer-
land, and access and support for experimental biology is In the field of biodiversity, the European BiCIKL (biodi-
limited due to a lack of coordination and integration. versity knowledge library) project aims to link data from
specimens, literature and -omics research. Led by SIB’s
The increasing importance of computational methods to literature services (SIBiLS) and the Swiss Plazi GmbH, it
process and analyse these datasets has already been recog- enables searches using publications from -omics and bio-
nised in Switzerland, leading to the creation of bioinfor- diversity research.
matics core facilities (dry laboratories) in Swiss academic
SwissBioData aims to significantly enhance our capacity to convert research data into knowledge and innovation
(photo SIB Swiss Institute of Bioinformatics, Nicolas Righetti | Lundi13)
Workflow standardisation and interactions between -om- and now needs an integrated biological data approach to
ics research in Switzerland are facilitated by the Swiss Me- advance.
tabolomics Society, founded in 2014, and the Swiss Pro-
teomics Society, which joined Life Science Switzerland The application of -omics technologies has moved the
(LS2) in 2016, as well as by SIB. On an individual level, field of nutritional science towards personalised nutri-
Swiss scientists are also engaged in bottom-up European tion at the genetic and phenotypic levels, including the
initiatives that include efforts to standardise workflows, gut microbiome. Bioinformatics, together with -omics
albeit without a central infrastructure or coordination, and technologies, are playing a key role in international nutri-
without dissemination of results on a national scale. tional research, as illustrated by the current efforts of the
European research community to build an ELIXIR Food
In conclusion, several limited-scale initiatives illustrate & Nutrition Community. However, the Swiss nutritional
the added value of integrating -omics workflows and of research community is not yet well linked to other fields
integrating and sharing multi-dimensional biological da- that use -omics approaches.
tasets. Nonetheless, a broad coordinated initiative across
Switzerland is currently lacking, thus limiting progress Similarly, the chemical ecology community has devel-
in biology. oped and successfully utilised -omics approaches to
identify natural chemicals that determine interactions
The substantial value generated by integrated -omics between plants, pests and biocontrol agents in natural
approaches, but also the challenges associated with the and agricultural systems, and the emerging genetic un-
democratisation of theses biotechnologies, are illustrated derstanding of these processes is fuelling efforts towards
by diverse biological research fields, such as nutritional pesticide-free agriculture. A series of bottom-up metab-
science and chemical ecology. These fields are charac- olomics platforms and services have been established to
terised by the complex and dynamic nature of molecular push these discoveries.
interactions taking place within and between biological
matrices and organisms. The integration of -omics tech- The Earth Biogenome Project and its European node, the
nologies, such as genomics, transcriptomics and metabo- European Reference Genome Atlas (ERGA), plan to gener-
lomics, plays a crucial role in deciphering these processes ate reference genome sequences of all eukaryotic species
on the planet. ELIXIR has already reached out to ERGA to a secure high-performance computing environment. Fur-
determine how the national nodes such as ELIXIR-Swit- thermore, it facilitates data interoperability and exchange
zerland can provide essential expertise required for the between data providers, such as Swiss healthcare provid-
project. The needs include the de novo assembly of tens ers, research institutions and technology centres, and data
of thousands of complex genomes, their annotation, sig- recipients, i.e. academic researchers from all over Swit-
nificant IT infrastructure resources, tools and workflows zerland. Extensive work on interoperability and work-
to manage the data, as well as training. flows, led by the SIB Data Coordination Centre, means it
is now possible to leverage knowledge from patient data
What is missing is a unified Swiss framework to sup- at hospitals nationwide. One example is the SPHN Driver
port hardware upgrades and link these platforms. Such Project on sepsis, which integrates digital data from pa-
a framework would improve access to the entire wealth tients but also multi-omics data, following the previously
of -omics data, thereby improving discovery pipelines mentioned requirements. The successful outcome of Bio
towards a deeper understanding of chemical ecological MedIT demonstrates that it is possible to make diverse
processes. The same holds for other stakeholders of these data types, coming from very different sources and loca-
platforms across biological disciplines, from plant and an- tions and requiring different levels of security, interop-
imal sciences to ecology. erable through common workflows. The knowledge and
experiences gained with the BioMedIT project could be
While the establishment of a highly integrated workflow leveraged to help SwissBioData to establish a network
and data integration platform for biology may seem like that streamlines and integrates -omics technologies across
a daunting task, a recent initiative within the domain of diverse biological fields.
personalised health illustrates the feasibility of such an
undertaking. The BioMedIT network, launched in 2017 Many countries are currently exploring and building -om-
and coordinated by SIB, established the infrastructure ics services and data analysis platforms. However, com-
backbone for the Swiss Personalised Health Network prehensive networks that comprise data infrastructures
(SPHN.ch), which is currently composed of three local facilitating the generation, storage, sharing and analysis
nodes: SIS at ETH Zurich, sciCORE at the University of of data from biology, nutritional sciences and biomedical
Basel, and Core-IT at SIB. These three nodes provide hard- research remain rare. Whereas certain countries are more
ware, scientific project support and data analysis services. advanced in this respect, others are catching up, benefit-
In addition, they are connected to each other, enabling ing from the experience of countries with more mature
the transfer of, and access to, large datasets from diverse infrastructures.
locations. The network provides Swiss researchers with
International Switzerland
Central Data Hub Nodes Users

– Coordination – Data generating Swiss biological research
– Data integration (e.g. -omics) community including
– Training platforms but not limited to
– Standardisation, ontolgies, – Local – Cell biology
vocabularies and dataset bioinformatics – Chemical ecology
FAIRification core facilities – Microbiology
– Life cycle management – Nutrition sciences
– Federated algorithms – Plant sciences
– Veterinary sciences
–…
SwissBioData builds on the expertise of the local nodes at Swiss research institutions, and the expertise of the SIB as host of the central hub to make
advanced data analysis support and training available to all experimental researchers in Switzerland (SwissBioData working group)
SwissBioData will facilitate the exchange of knowledge on specialised data analysis methods between experts and researchers
(photo SIB Swiss Institute of Bioinformatics, Nicolas Righetti | Lundi13)
Collaborations between public and academic partners cal requirement by leveraging and enhancing the current
and the big players in cloud services, such as Amazon data generation and analysis infrastructures across Swit-
and Google, are already starting in order to create inter- zerland.
connected data ecosystems that overcome silos related to
the generation, analysis and sharing of research data. The
biodiversity research community is using CERN’s Zenodo 8.3.2 Proposed developments
repository and its option to create a highly customised re-
pository to generate FAIR data from information extracted The current revolution in biological, nutritional and bio-
from biodiversity literature, such as figures and taxonom- medical research is driven by large (-omics) datasets and
ic treatments, and digital specimens. These data consti- advanced, integrated analyses. Research infrastructure-
tute over 50% of all datasets in GBIF. The SPHN initiative based on high-quality data serves as a major driver for in-
and the strategic focus area Personalised Health and Re- novation, accelerating both science and linked entrepre-
lated Technologies (PHRT) of the ETH Domain have led neurship. Our capacity to accelerate progress in biology
Switzerland to build its own ‘private Swiss cloud’, rather rests on the ability of researchers across Switzerland to
than outsourcing data to commercial environments. generate, share and access high-quality genomics, epig-
enomics, transcriptomics, proteomics and metabolomics
Within biology, -omics approaches currently mostly rely data and biological knowledge, and on their ability to ac-
on local infrastructure and workflows, and better integra- cess the latest data analysis techniques. For this purpose,
tion across Switzerland without commercial outsourcing we need a scalable and sustainable network that enables
is highly desirable. It is important to sustain the current researchers in basic and applied biological sciences to
efforts and align the research infrastructure with the evo- generate, share, combine, analyse and act on biological
lutions in society, such as digitisation, and the need for datasets in molecular biology, physiology, ecology and
integration of knowledge bases in research workflows. In evolution, including information contained in databases
order to coordinate the production of -omics data, as well and the scientific literature. The proposed developments
as other data types, and fully exploit and integrate them to will foster synergies between the different biological do-
generate biologically meaningful insights, further exper- mains, help dissolve boundaries between them, and max-
tise development, standardisation and capacity building imise the use of existing resources.
is essential. SwissBioData will help to achieve this criti-
SwissBioData is a research infrastructure that will build ensure that the ‘fittest’ resources are kept and that those
on the expertise within SIB, as well as the existing -omics that are no longer up-to-date are phased out.
platforms and local bioinformatics core facilities. By up- – Data management services.
grading and interlinking these infrastructures, SwissBio- – Common ontologies, vocabularies and data formats,
Data will structure the generation and use of data for Swit- and standard data models for data types in different bi-
zerland’s biological research of the future. SwissBioData ological domains, to ensure interoperability and inte-
will consist of local nodes, including core facilities and gration.
local analysis platforms, and a central data hub. – Tools and expertise for dataset FAIRification.
– Storage of FAIR datasets that do not have an obvious
Local nodes will include bioinformatics core facilities ‘home’ in interoperable repositories or curated knowl-
and -omics platforms that are situated within Swiss insti- edgebases.
tutions of higher education and research institutes. The – Documentation of best practices and guidelines.
nodes will include units that primarily serve the biology – Links to experts and advisors that facilitate data stand-
community, but also units that are at the interface of biol- ardisation and analysis, to complement the local exper-
ogy and medicine, such as the BioMedIT nodes. The local tise and leverage the knowledge present at the other
nodes will retain autonomy and will be able to operate in- nodes.
dependently, thus optimally accommodating local needs. – A federated analysis system, including for artificial in-
Their role within SwissBioData will be to: telligence (AI) and machine learning.
– Build and maintain a strong local capacity for high-qual- – Structuring and annotation of datasets, in collaboration
ity data generation in accordance with the needs of with their providers, to ensure the power and the accu-
their scientific communities. racy of the AI algorithms that will feed on them.
– Coordinate hardware renewal and updates to enhance – Connection of the existing computational infrastruc-
compatibility and comparability of datasets, in particu- tures hosted at different academic institutions to opti-
lar for highly context-dependent approaches, through a mise the sharing of data and of computational resources.
joint procurement and funding plan within SwissBio- – Sustainable data governance to ensure the long-term
Data. health of the data network.
– Advise on, plan and execute analyses of biological sam-
ples in the context of individual or joint research pro- Building upon the recent explosion in the areas of
jects. high-throughput technologies, cloud computing and big
– Provide computational and data analysis services for data analytics, SwissBioData has the potential to dramat-
which there is a great need locally and/or and facilitate ically accelerate discoveries that will ultimately support
the exchange of knowledge on specialised data analysis general research and innovation in the Swiss biology
between researchers at different institutions/nodes. community. SwissBioData will help researchers to ex-
– Maintain, update and run data analysis tools and pipe- pand their knowledge through the accumulation and in-
lines locally. tegration of much larger and more diverse datasets, and it
– Make large datasets available within the network, fol- will help to ensure that the technologies that are applied
lowing FAIR data sharing principles. are state-of-the-art. Whenever possible, SwissBioData will
provide links to data contained in biobanks, the scientific
The local nodes will be connected to a central hub that literature and international knowledgebases and deposi-
could be hosted by SIB. The central hub will be used to tion databases.
identify, develop and disseminate standard tools and
workflows for biology, and it will enable joint efforts. AI will be a key tool in biology-related research in the
Tasks that are currently executed locally but that could be coming years. Building an analysis framework based on
centralised and standardised will be taken care of by the AI, close to the concrete applications, will help to focus
central hub. The central hub will also make advanced data the development of AI towards practical outputs. Swiss-
analysis support available to all experimental research- BioData will counteract the current generation of data and
ers in Switzerland, regardless of the existence and/or the algorithm monopolies, where only a limited number of
competencies of a core facility in their host institutions. people are able to explore the collected data. The power of
The central data hub will provide: the full system of decentralised servers could be leveraged
– Coordination of SwissBioData. for future research applications by implementing federat-
– State-of-the-art bioinformatics tools and standardised ed algorithms, e.g. for machine learning/AI, where pro-
pipelines/workflows, as well as the associated training. cessing is distributed across multiple nodes. In this mod-
– Life-cycle management and quality control of the data el, data could be distributed across the network of nodes,
resources and software tools in the network. This will the analysis split and run in parallel on the network, and
the results returned to the originating node. An important
At the forefront on the level of -omics techniques with excellent wet-laboratory platforms, the amount of data generated in Switzerland exceeds the
data management and analysis capacity (photo SIB Swiss Institute of Bioinformatics, Nicolas Righetti | Lundi13)
feature of such a system is that an analysis could be ini- laborates with industry in the development of automat-
tiated from any of the nodes in the system, meaning that ed mass spectrometry and robotics systems. Expanding
computing power would not be limited to local computa- such collaborations to high-quality bioinformatics work-
tional infrastructure. This is an opportunity for close col- flows would be beneficial to both science and industry
laboration between the life science community and SDSC. and could further enhance and promote joint ventures.
Overall, several Swiss-based industries apply -omics ap-
The opportunities offered by SwissBioData to the indus- proaches in their R&D efforts and have established col-
try are substantial and accommodate societal digitalisa- laborations with academic and federal research institutes.
tion as a whole. SwissBioData will provide an excellent They could greatly benefit from a more coordinated and
platform for pharma and biotech companies (including centralised data processing platform, with well-defined
start-ups) to take part in the development of a digital re- workflows, that also optimises data access control and
search infrastructure and to benefit from the opportunities management.
that it brings. It will give access to structured, high-quality
data, an excellent driver for innovation, all while respect- In summary, many research fields within the Swiss bi-
ing data privacy regulations. For illustration, Switzerland ology community, including molecular and chemical
has a large investment in wearables, apps and other sensor ecology, microbiology, nutritional science, personalised
technologies. The next generation of low-voltage sensors health, plant science and veterinary science, make use of
are being developed by Swiss start-ups, in collaboration state-of-the-art tools in molecular biology and will benefit
with institutions such as the Swiss Center for Electron- from a strong network for data generation, analysis and
ics and Microtechnology (CSEM). These sensor develop- sharing. Nodes across the Swiss research landscape will
ments will filter down to all areas of biological research be upgraded and organised to optimise the interactions
and generate an immense source of exploitable data. A between users and the central data hub. The resulting in-
Digital Innovation Hub (DIH) has been set up in order to sights will be of major importance for society, as they will
foster public–private partnerships and developments in help to find solutions to pressing problems concerning bi-
that domain and to leverage European collaborations and otechnology, food safety, animal health, sustainable agri-
funding opportunities. The biology community also col- culture, human health and other topics.
The majority of imaging facilities are staffed with one or

two image analysis specialists at most, which falls short
of what is needed. In addition, their support is generally
limited to standard analysis pipelines that are poorly suit-
ed and underperforming. This leads to a ‘cottage industry’
of home-made solutions that are tailored, usually in an
8.4 SwissBioImaging autodidact manner or at best by a specialist hired by in-
dividual laboratories, to extract only a small subset of the
8.4.1 Image-driven discoveries vast richness of information contained in images. As these
analysis solutions are usually bespoke designs for specific
The wealth of information in imaging data is of incredi- imaging challenges, disseminating or generalising them is
ble value to biological research. The ongoing microsco- extremely inefficient, meaning that maximum benefit is
py revolution is making previously unobtainable insights not achieved. Occasionally, such specialists are embed-
possible. Laboratories across Switzerland are generating ded in small local communities that can provide some
datasets that are in the terabyte range per day, which coordination, teaching and knowledge transfer. However,
dwarfs genome and proteome datasets. Moreover, when without a dedicated national infrastructure, networking
compared with DNA and protein sequencing data, where with other scientists with the required expertise is limit-
the core information is stored in one-dimensional strings ed. The situation is worsened by the rapid rise of uncoor-
of ATCG and amino acid variables, respectively, imaging dinated AI-based approaches, which are already revolu-
generates films of three-dimensional data that are incom- tionising the way one can analyse image data.
parably rich in qualitative and quantitative variables, in-
cluding shape, the intensities of multiple signals, and con- The current situation involves numerous parallel research
text. When images are captured from living samples, they efforts, each embedded in a specific research grant. Stand-
additionally provide insights into essential system dy- ards are set individually and are not discussed. There is
namics that are impossible to obtain by other means. An- little coordination of efforts between individual laborato-
other unique benefit of imaging is its multi-scale nature, ries or universities/research institutions. This fragmenta-
which potentially enables a comprehensive understand- tion prevents the generation of critical mass and makes
ing of living systems, from the level of single molecules to everyone underperform. As a result of such specificity,
entire organisms and communities. Such unprecedented current image analysis barely scratches the surface of the
data volumes and data richness demand fundamentally full information pool present in a given image dataset.
new approaches in data handling and analysis, since the Furthermore, once established, such solutions frequently
tools and procedures established for the -omics type of disappear again when their inventors leave the laborato-
large biological datasets, as described in the previous sec- ry, which leads to existing solutions being reinvented in
tion on SwissBioData, are not applicable. another context in another laboratory. This process uses
The diversity of novel imaging technologies come with

high hardware costs (e.g. specialised microscopes). As a
consequence, all Swiss universities have established cen- Nuclei (DAPI) Lgr5::DTR-GFP Lysozyme
tralised bioimaging facilities and imaging centres, mostly
focused on microscopy but also covering numerous oth-
er digital acquisition technologies. These are generally
well equipped and staffed with specialists that provide
the respective training in image acquisition to a range
of users, often including doctoral students, post-doctor-
al associates and representatives of the private sector. In
addition, these specialists can often offer support to sci-
entists requiring customised image acquisition hardware
solutions. While the main purpose of all such facilities is
to enable and optimise image data acquisition, scientific
discoveries only emerge after such data are analysed. Cur-
rently, this challenge is left to the individual biologists
and laboratories, which generally lack the necessary ex-
pertise. For this reason, image data analysis has become Highly multiplexed, high-throughput time course imaging of intestinal
a bottleneck that substantially limits scientific progress. organoids at high temporal and spatial resolution
(photo Prisca Liberali, FMI, Basel)
Sections through a developing fly embryo, extracted from two selected viewing angles. Shown is a low-resolution overview of one of 900 film frames
(photo Damian Brunner, University of Zurich)
financial resources and personnel in a highly inefficient imaging technology. The current situation is comparable
manner. to the rise of Systems Biology at the turn of the millen-
nium, when large genome and proteome datasets could
Worst of all, numerous laboratories do not even have suddenly be acquired, leading to the uncoordinated es-
the means to implement any computational analysis of tablishment of various databases and the implementation
their images, owing to a lack of expertise and dedicated of different standards. Only later did this work become
funding. This is especially the case for smaller and newly coordinated and standardised in a major international ef-
founded research groups, such as those financed by the fort. These investments in turn formed the foundation for
SNF Ambizione, Eccellenza and Prima programmes. Such the implementation of new technologies, such as the sin-
laboratories are often left with classical qualitative assess- gle-cell sequencing-based approaches that are currently
ments and a lack of statistical rigour. If unaddressed, one revolutionising genome research. It is important that such
can envisage a future schism in the community, between efforts occur at an earlier stage for imaging data, not only
the laboratories that have access to such quantitative to optimise the current efforts but also to facilitate emerg-
analysis tools and the more qualitative ‘have nots’. Here, ing developments and spark unforeseeable discoveries.
‘democratisation’ is urgently needed.
Thanks to the financial possibilities and, in particular, the
Not only has the importance of the bioimaging revolu- universities’ foresight in establishing top-notch imaging
tion been recognised in a number of recent Nobel Prizes facilities, Switzerland is certainly at the forefront in terms
(fluorescent proteins 2008; super-resolution microscopy of image acquisition technologies. However, only a few
2014; Cryo-electron microscopy 2017, including Jacques laboratories have been able to sufficiently invest in the
Dubochet from the University of Lausanne), but progress development and implementation of new internationally
in this area has resulted in notable changes to the scien- recognised analysis approaches to fully exploit the data-
tific landscape. Worldwide, microscopy-based imaging sets produced. The bioimaging field is growing at such
centres are sprouting up everywhere. For instance, the a breath-taking pace that it is hard to predict where it is
US has launched the Janelia Research Campus, which is heading – as is the case for many cutting-edge sciences.
dedicated to visually mapping, quantifying and model- In particular, the implementation of AI has already start-
ling the brain and is almost exclusively driven by modern ed to fundamentally transform the way scientists analyse
microscopy technology and computational approaches. and quantify their imaging data. This is true not only in
Furthermore, there are numerous initiatives worldwide the life sciences but in all image-based research and ap-
that aim to provide infrastructure to handle and analyse plications. Approaches like AI, especially for quantitative
image analysis, will undoubtedly lay the foundation for with a centralised infrastructure that can simultaneously
sophisticated computational modelling of processes with serve all these needs.
unprecedented predictive power. This will substantially
increase our understanding of underlying processes and The implementation of SwissBioImaging, a national in-
will have a major impact on new developments in all frastructure dedicated to bioimaging, will be an important
aspects of human life. Currently, many branches of in- step towards coping with such demands. SwissBioImag-
dustry are investing heavily in the usage of AI to analyse ing will:
images. Typical applications include images acquired in – Play a role in coordinating and supervising national
a military context, images posted in social networks, im- and international community efforts in image data pro-
ages acquired in diagnostic medicine, and images from cessing and handling.
surveillance cameras, not only in relation to crime but – Perform, in close collaboration with the national com-
also in monitoring the spread of infections. Such analy- munity, cutting-edge research in generalisable image
sis is usually designed to recognise selected features, but analysis methods of the future, in particular including
organisations like Google are probably implementing less AI technologies.
biased AI analyses of all kinds of images, not only from
social media, to recognise unprecedented and unforeseea- SwissBioImaging will not only ‘democratise’ bioimaging
ble patterns. Also, AI operates ahead of image acquisition data and next generation bioimage data analysis tools but
in most digital cameras to recognise and optimise image also provide the highest level of scientific support to all
features. life science researchers, analogous to how CERN is crucial
to all of particle physics. One fundamental difference, of
course, is that at CERN data collection is rate limiting,
8.4.2 Proposed developments while the standard decentralised collection of biological
image data at present has hardly any limits, except for
Biological imaging, similar to medical imaging and proba- the need for more electron microscopes in the context of
bly other image-based sciences, is reaching a point where structural biology.
individual laboratories can no longer manage to compre-
hensively quantify the large amounts of data they pro- Due to the overarching demand for image data analysis
duce. There is a strong desire in the Swiss life science and handling solutions, it is imaginable that such an infra-
community to coordinate the many isolated efforts lead- structure could be embedded in a larger context, addition-
ing to the development of powerful image analysis tools, ally covering respective efforts in medical imaging and
to set standards in image acquisition, processing, analy- in agricultural, biodiversity, taxonomic and environmen-
sis, handling and storage, to ensure reproducibility, and tal sciences. This would generate a hub of critical mass
to better reach out to the international communities in with worldwide impact and visibility, giving the Swiss
order to rapidly access new developments. This comes research community a substantial competitive advantage,
with the need for efficient information dissemination and which can be expected to translate to industrial applica-
specialised teaching. All this could be best implemented tions as well.
Angular fragment of developing zebrafish skin, showing segmented nuclei of deliberately manipulated (light green) and wild type (dark green) basal
keratinocytes with their changing mRNA transcripts (yellow dots) (photo Darren Gilmour, University of Zurich).
The highly sophisticated analysis methods, which need Recently, researchers from the European Molecular Bi-
to be developed in the context of bioimaging-driven re- ology Laboratory (EMBL) have established Euro-BioIm-
search, will directly feed back on numerous industrial aging as a European Research Infrastructure Consortium
applications. This is particularly interesting in the con- (ERIC). By integrating national imaging facilities as nodes,
text of three-dimensional image content, where modern Euro-BioImaging will coordinate and optimise all Euro-
microscopy is far ahead of the standard image acquisi- pean efforts on image data acquisition and exploitation
tion technologies. As for the converse flow of information, and provide a link to similar efforts worldwide. Current-
however, it is unlikely that the imaging software devel- ly, Switzerland is not involved in Euro-BioImaging, but a
oped by the industry will be made publicly and freely direct link to this international infrastructure would pro-
available to the scientific biomedical community. vide a connection to all other relevant European imaging
nodes and give Swiss researchers access to the rapidly
Humans are strongly motivated and convinced by visual evolving expertise, particularly regarding image analy-
input. It is clear that any kind of development in the con- sis technologies. Moreover, this link would allow Swiss
text of imaging technology will have an impact on socie- researchers to contribute to the establishment of interna-
ty and education in numerous ways. Complex processes tional standards. Notably, the initiators of Euro-BioImag-
are more accessible when illustrated by series of anno- ing previously contacted several Swiss researchers in an
tated images. For example, human development can be effort to integrate Swiss bioimaging. Unfortunately, this
understood through images of a developing embryo that first connection did not result in concrete engagement. A
are linked to detailed multi-layered information on mo- SwissBioImaging infrastructure dedicated to image anal-
lecular mechanisms and on the genome, transcriptome, ysis would not only serve as a perfect link to Euro-BioIm-
proteome or metabolome. Additionally, this example il- aging but, because of its specialisation, represent a unique
lustrates how in the longer term the SwissBioImaging in- and prestigious node within the European network.
frastructure will naturally connect with the above-men-
tioned SwissBioData infrastructure and with the general
goal of placing mechanisms back into their native context.
The simultaneous development of advanced visualisation

methods, an important spin off of this infrastructure, will
provide a greater understanding of living systems that
will be intuitively accessible to the general public. It can
be expected that, in the near future, such computer visual-
isation developments will replace traditional textbooks to
accelerate learning and the dissemination of information.
9 Conclusions
The present Biology Roadmap for Research Infrastructures outlines the results of intensive meetings and
discussions that took place between 2019 and 2020 among representatives of many disciplines in biol-
ogy. The infrastructure needs for the years 2025–2028 were identified. In order to stay at the forefront of
worldwide research, Swiss biological research needs to be supported in a concrete and targeted way
through the establishment of the following highly complementary large research infrastructures de-
scribed in the present document:
Æ SwissBioCollection
Æ SwissBioSites
Æ SwissBioData
Æ SwissBioImaging
The proposed infrastructures will be accessible to the entire Swiss biological and biomedical community
in academia and the private sector and to international research collaborators. They will serve as the
basis for studying and responding to ongoing environmental and societal challenges: climate change,
biodiversity loss, sustainable production of food, fodder and fibre, and health issues such as the SARS-
CoV-2 pandemic.
SwissBioCollection, SwissBioSites, SwissBioData and SwissBioImaging constitute an ensemble of infra-
structures that fill identified gaps in the present Swiss research landscape. Common to all four infrastruc-
tures is the challenge of comprehensive data exploitation, which often constitutes a limiting bottleneck.
In all areas of research, the configuration and setup of instrumentation should go hand-in-hand with the
development of data analysis procedures that match data acquisition schemes and data exploitation
goals. Coordinated data management should lead to interoperable research datasets while still respect-
ing the specific requirements of the numerous specialised sub-fields of biology. Therefore, four separate,
dedicated network infrastructures are proposed to keep Switzerland at the forefront of international
research in biology.
Competitive research is not possible without international networking and the ability to attract worldwide
attention. Regarding international infrastructures, European initiatives and programmes are considered
the most important for Swiss biologists. Therefore, it is crucial to establish strong national infrastructures
that can serve as significant nodes in European networks, thus strengthening the ties between Swiss
and foreign researchers. Consequently, Switzerland should join and participate further in the following
international infrastructures: DiSSCo, EMPHASIS, BBMRI, LifeWatch ERIC and Euro-BioImaging. In addition,
it should maintain its membership in ICOS, ELIXIR, EMBL, EMBO and GBIF, as they provide excellent, in-
novative research programmes and shared resources for biologists, especially young researchers, and
facilitate major collaborations.
The present roadmap is the first of its kind for the Swiss biology community and represents the view of
scientists from many sub-disciplines of biology. After this challenging and stimulating first exercise, it is
clear to all of the authors that this work should continue in the future to further coordinate and consol-
idate biological research and research strategies. The continued process will allow additional sub-com-
munities to organise themselves and join the Round Table Biology with their specific considerations and
propositions.
10 Appendix
Appendix 1: Detailed description of the cialised sub-roundtables, which each, in a self-organised

establishment of the Round Table Biology procedure, evaluated the interest of the Swiss research
(RoTaBio) and the elaboration of the Biology community in their specialised field (Table 2). In the sec-
ond RoTaBio meeting (November 2019), the representa-
Roadmap for Research Infrastructures tives of these 12 sub-roundtables were invited to present
their requests for national research infrastructures. The
The elaboration of the present document began with the collected information was condensed in a matrix showing
identification of sub-fields of biology and existing nation- biological communities/topics and requested infrastruc-
al and international infrastructures/programmes focusing tures. In the third meeting (February 2020), four working
on biology to invite researchers from all these fields to groups were formed based on the matrix and the gener-
participate in the Round Table Biology – RoTaBio (Ta- al structure of the RoTaBio roadmap was agreed on. The
ble 1). High-profile representatives of the biological sub- leaders of each sub-group then elaborated the first draft of
fields, Swiss representatives of national platforms and a proposal for the required infrastructure, including dis-
international programmes, and the presidents of the spe- cussions and ideas of the interested communities. In the
cialised societies and national committees of the Inter- fourth meeting (May 2020), the four proposals were pre-
national Science Council (ISC) of the SCNAT’s Platform sented and synergies, overlaps and contradictions were
Biology were invited to participate in the RoTaBio, with identified. The four proposals were then joined in a single
the aim to write a roadmap for research infrastructures draft and reviewed by the authors (members of the four
for biology. In total, more than 50 people were invited, sub-groups), before a broader research community was
representing all Swiss universities and all institutes of the asked to comment on the roadmap and incorporate miss-
ETH Domain. In the inaugurating meeting of the RoTaBio ing information. More than 130 scientists were invited to
(July 2019, 30 interested persons invited), the communi- review the document. During the whole process the entire
ty was informed about the mandate and numerous topics biology community had the opportunity to join the work-
were identified which would potentially profit from new ing groups and to integrate missing propositions.
infrastructures. This resulted in the formation of 12 spe-
Table 1. Biological sub-fields, national platforms, international

programmes and member societies of the SCNAT’s Platform Biology
invited to participate in the Round Table Biology
Sub-fields of biology Specialised societies and national committees of the International

Science Council (ISC)
Big data
Life Science Switzerland (LS2)
Biochemistry
Schweizerische Arbeitsgemeinschaft für wissenschaftliche Ornithologie
Biocomputing / artificial intelligence
(SAWO)
Bioinformatics
Schweizerische Gesellschaft für Wildtierbiologie (SGW)
Biophysics
Swiss Association of Bryology and Lichenology (BRYOLICH)
Cellular and developmental biology
Swiss Botanical Society (SBS)
Cellular biology
Swiss Entomological Society (SES)
Chemical ecology
Swiss Laboratory Animal Science Association (SGV)
Ecology and environmental biology
Swiss Society for Anthropology (SSA)
Ethology
Swiss Society for the History of Medicine and Sciences (SGGMN)
Evolution
Swiss Society for Microbiology (SGM)
Evolutionary ecology
Swiss Society of Agronomy (SGPW)
Genetics
Swiss Society of Anatomy, Histology and Embryology (SSAHE)
Human biology
Swiss Society of Pharmacology and Toxicology (SSPT)
Mathematical modelling
Swiss Society of Phytiatry (SSP)
Microbiology
Swiss Society of Tropical Medicine and Parasitology (SSTMP)
Molecular biology
Swiss Systematics Society (SSS)
Neurobiology
Swiss Zoological Society (SZS)
Plant biology
National Committee of the International Union of Biochemistry and
Structural biology Molecular Biology (NC IUBMB)
Synthetic biology National Committee of the International Union of Biological Sciences
Systems biology / -omics (NC IUBS)
Virology National Committee of the International Union of Food Science and

Technology (NC IUFoST)
National platforms
National Committee of the International Union of Nutritional Sciences
InfoSpecies (NC IUNS)
Metabolomics and Proteomics Platform (MAPP) National Committee of the International Union for Pure and Applied
Plant Science Center (PSC) Biophysics (NC IUPAB)
Swiss Biobanking Platform (SBP)
Swiss Institute of Bioinformatics (SIB)
Table 2. List of initial sub-roundtables
Swiss Natural History Collections Network (SwissCollNet) of RoTaBio
International programmes with Swiss participation
Agriculture and ecology
Blue Brain Project
Biobanking
CETAF
Bioimaging
DiSSCo
Bioinformatics
EMBO / EMBC
Evolutionary biology
EMBL
Metabolomics and analytical chemistry
ELIXIR
Neural networks
Global Biodiversity Information Facility (GBIF)
Stem cells
Structural biology
Swiss natural history collections
Synthetic cells and life forms
Systems biology and large research infrastructures
Appendix 2: Current and recommended Swiss

status in international research infrastructures
Table 3: International programmes/infrastructures identified as being important for Swiss participation
Infrastructure / Programme Abbreviation Current status of Switzerland Recommended status

Biobanking and Biomolecular Resource Research Infrastructure BBMRI Observer Full member
Distributed Systems of Scientific Collections DiSSCo Participation of individual scientists Full member
ELIXIR Full member Full member
European Infrastructure for Plant Phenotyping (planned) EMPHASIS Supportive Full member
European Molecular Biology Laboratory EMBL Full member Full member
European Molecular Biology Organisation EMBO Full member Full member
European Reference Genome Atlas ERGA Full member Full member
Euro-BioImaging None Full member
Global Biodiversity Information Facility GBIF Full member Full member
Integrated Carbon Observation System ICOS Observer Full member
LifeWatch ERIC None Participation
SCNAT – network of knowledge for the benefit of society
The Swiss Academy of Sciences (SCNAT) and its network of 35,000 experts works at regional, national and interna-
tional level for the future of science and society. It strengthens the awareness for the sciences as a central pillar of
cultural and economic development. The breadth of its support makes it a representative partner for politics. The
SCNAT links the sciences, provides expertise, promotes the dialogue between science and society, identifies and
evaluates scientific developments and lays the foundation for the next generation of natural scientists. It is part of
the association of the Swiss Academies of Arts and Sciences..

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Vol. 16, No.

PUBLISHER AND CONTACT

RECOMMENDED FORM OF CITATION

SCNAT ROADMAP COORDINATION

This report can be downloaded free of charges from scnat.ch/en/id/BGqdL

ISSN (print) 2297-1793

6 The current Swiss research landscape and the international context�����������������������������������������������16

8 Development of national infrastructures and Swiss participation

2 Findings and Recommendations

Finding 6: New imaging technol-

Finding 7: Swiss biologists benefit from membership in in-

4 Purpose and scope of this roadmap

5 Biology: the study of life

6 The current Swiss research landscape

7 Vision for the future

8 Development of national infrastructures and Swiss participation

Swiss researchers continuously push the frontier of

observations, and they are a resource for education and

Biological material stored in biobanks and the corre-

Despite its small size, Switzerland holds over 60 million

At the international level, a European initiative called

8.1.2 Proposed developments

Today, it is considered vital to provide and ensure access

In summary, SwissBioCollection will:

structures that were established as larger-scale and longer-

A flowering meadow in Engadin, Switzerland (photo Gabriela Brändle, Agroscope)

The sites of this highly instrumented hub will be com-

institutions and research centres. Several of these core fa-

Central Data Hub Nodes Users

The majority of imaging facilities are staffed with one or

The diversity of novel imaging technologies come with

The simultaneous development of advanced visualisation

Appendix 1: Detailed description of the cialised sub-roundtables, which each, in a self-organised

Table 1. Biological sub-fields, national platforms, international

Sub-fields of biology Specialised societies and national committees of the International

Virology National Committee of the International Union of Food Science and

Appendix 2: Current and recommended Swiss

Table 3: International programmes/infrastructures identified as being important for Swiss participation

Infrastructure / Programme Abbreviation Current status of Switzerland Recommended status

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6 The current Swiss research landscape and the international context��16