DOIs: A new era for germplasm labelling

Digital Object Identifiers (DOI) have now been chosen to provide a globally unique and permanent mechanism for identifying germplasm. A DOI is a standardised alphanumeric string that is assigned by a registration agency and provides a persistent link to the location of information about the object on the Internet (unlike URLs, which can lose connectivity if they aren’t updated). The Genebank Platform aims to have DOIs assigned to 100% of accessions in the international genebanks managed by CGIAR centres by 2018.