About Us
Advancing research, accessibility, and conservation
of Israel’s biodiversity
About Us
Advancing research, accessibility, and conservation
of Israel’s biodiversity
The Israeli Biodiversity Curation Center (IBCC) is a groundbreaking national initiative established in response to a call for proposals by the Council for Higher Education. IBCC guided by a clear vision: to build a unified, cloud-based infrastructure that transforms how Israel studies, documents, and protects its biodiversity. By integrating existing biological collections with actively generated new data layers, IBCC creates a comprehensive, open, and accessible research platform designed to empower scientific discovery, guide evidence-based policy and strengthen long-term conservation efforts across the country.
At the heart of IBCC is a collaborative consortium that unites academic researchers, government agencies, conservation organizations, and technological partners. This multidisciplinary network-spanning evolutionary biology, ecology, taxonomy, genetics, bioinformatics, biochemistry, microbiology, curation, and conservation biologists, enables IBCC to link data across all biological scales, from molecules to ecosystems. Through shared expertise and coordinated action, IBCC serves as a national hub supporting research, education, industry innovation, and decision-making, establishing a new standard for biodiversity knowledge management in Israel.
Our Partners
We are a consortium comprising seven academic, governmental, and conservation institutes.
Our expert team includes evolutionary biologists, ecologists, curators, biochemists, microbiologists, geneticists, bioinformaticians, taxonomists, and conservation biologists.
Coordinating Team
Advisory Committee
Anton Güntsch
Center for Biodiversity Informatics and Collection Data Integration
Andreas Graner
Leibniz Institute of Plant Genetics
and Crop Plant Research (IPK)
Michal Levy
Israeli Ministry of Agriculture and Food Security
Dror Hawlena
The Hebrew University of Jerusalem
IBCC Partners
Asaph Aharoni
Weizmann Institute of Science
Avi Bar-Massada
University of Haifa
Eyal Ben-Hur
The Hebrew University of Jerusalem
Rakefet David-Schwartz
Agricultural Research Organization – Volcani Institute
Ori Fragman-Sapir
Hebrew University of Jerusalem
Efrat Gavish-Regev
The Hebrew University of Jerusalem
Gili Greenbaum
The Hebrew University of Jerusalem
Ronen Kadmon
The Hebrew University of Jerusalem
Gila Kahila Bar-Gal
The Hebrew University of Jerusalem
Avraham (Avi) Levy
Weizmann Institute of Science
Itay Mayrose
Tel Aviv University
Ziv Reich
Weizmann Institute of Science
Gadi Schuster
Tel Hai University and Technion Israel Institute of Technology
Efrat Sheffer
The Hebrew University of Jerusalem
Ofer Steinitz
Israel Nature and Parks Authority
Merav Lebel Vine
Israeli Nature and Parks Authority
Etzion Bar Noy
Running Systems
