Fish Reef Assessment Multi-metric Evaluation System

Scientific platform for collecting, managing, and analysing reef-fish survey data. Covers species traits, field surveys, marine biogeography, and ecological indices in a single integrated system.

Marine Ecology Reef Assessment Biodiversity Data Science

What FRAMES Does

Traits

Full taxonomic registry from Class to Species. Stores morphological, trophic, life-history, and biogeographic attributes for each species, including allometric parameters, IUCN status, and vulnerability indices, plus a per-species photo gallery with captions, credits, and references.

Surveys

Structured data entry for underwater visual census (UVC) and Stereo-BRUVs surveys. Each survey records site metadata, transects, and species observations with length and abundance. Includes observer management and role-based access control.

Biogeography

Organises survey sites into marine provinces and ecoregions following the MEOW framework (Spalding et al., 2007). Enables spatial filtering and cross-province comparisons, and an interactive map that encodes survey effort, abundance and biomass density, or species richness per site, with density heat layers.

Metrics

A dedicated Metrics Analysis page turns validated observations into ecological indices, organised by category (Richness is built out; Diversity, Evenness, Dominance and Rarity follow). The Richness view corrects species counts for sampling effort and estimates inventory completeness (Chao1/Chao2, rarefaction). The engine is fully decoupled from the data layer. All calculations run on pre-validated DataFrames.

Built-in Quality & Reproducibility

Data Quality & Reproducibility

Not a module but a guarantee enforced across every part of the system. Every record carries audit timestamps and unique identifiers, and database-level constraints prevent duplicate observations per transect. Species traits are cross-referenced against published datasets (Quimbayo et al., 2021), and survey data is validated against the Quimbayo et al. (2023) TimeFISH long-term survey, so the platform can be rebuilt entirely from open, published data.

Data Sources

BIOGEOGRAPHY Marine provinces, ecoregions & biogeographic classification

Spalding et al., 2007: Dataset Marine Ecoregions of the World (MEOW): a bioregionalization of coastal and shelf areas. Province and ecoregion classification framework used to organise survey sites into marine biogeographic units. Published in BioScience.
https://doi.org/10.1641/B570707

MEOW: DataBasin Dataset GIS dataset for the Marine Ecoregions of the World (MEOW).
https://databasin.org/datasets/3b6b12e7bcca419990c9081c0af254a2/

SURVEYS Long-term reef fish community surveys & field observations

BioScales Lab: TimeFISH Data Portal Interactive data portal maintained by the BioScales Lab providing access to the expanded and updated TimeFISH long-term reef fish survey dataset used in FRAMES. Source of the current survey, transect, and observation records loaded into this system. Last update: 2026.
https://bioscaleslab.shinyapps.io/

Quimbayo et al., 2023: Dataset TimeFISH: Long-term assessment of reef fish assemblages in a transition zone in the Southwestern Atlantic. Supplementary dataset containing long-term reef fish community records, species abundances, and site metadata from the Southwestern Atlantic transition zone. Published as a Data Paper in Ecology.
File: ecy3966-sup-0001-Data_S1.zip · Download from ESA Journals · https://doi.org/10.1002/ecy.3966

TRAITS Species life-history traits & taxonomy

Quimbayo et al., 2021 Life-history traits, geographical range, and conservation aspects of reef fishes from the Atlantic and Eastern Pacific. Compiled species-level dataset including morphological traits, trophic ecology, reproductive biology, geographical range, depth range, IUCN conservation status, and vulnerability indices. Published as a Data Paper in Ecology.
File: ecy3298-sup-0001-DataS1.zip · Download from ESA Journals · https://doi.org/10.1002/ecy.3298

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How to Cite FRAMES

Bertolini & Floeter, 2026 Bertolini, C., & Floeter, S. R. (2026). FRAMES: Fish Reef Assessment Multi-metric Evaluation System (Version 1.0) [Ecological Data Portal]. Laboratório de Macroecologia e Biogeografia Marinha (LBMM/UFSC), Universidade Federal de Santa Catarina (UFSC). https://frames.ufsm.br/

Download BibTeX

The data Cite data downloaded from FRAMES with the date of the download, for example: Bertolini, C., & Floeter, S. R. (2026). FRAMES reef fish census data [Data set]. LBMM/UFSC. https://frames.ufsm.br/ (downloaded 2026-11-08). Downloads are licensed CC BY 4.0. Records imported from TimeFISH also cite Quimbayo et al. (2023), listed under Bibliography References.

Download all data

Technology Stack

Django 5.2 Web framework

Python 3.13 Runtime

PostgreSQL 18 Database

psycopg 3 DB driver

pandas 3.0 Data processing

numpy Numerical computing

Plotly 7.1+ Visualisation

Bootstrap 5.3 UI framework

HTMX Dynamic UI

django-filter Queryset filtering

crispy-forms Form rendering

MapLibre GL Interactive maps

Pillow Image handling

Privacy

How FRAMES handles personal data What FRAMES records about visitors and observers, why, for how long, and the rights you have under Brazil's General Data Protection Law (LGPD).

Authors & Contributors

Cristiano Bertolini

Software Engineer

UFSC · LBMM

Sergio Ricardo Floeter

Senior Researcher

UFSC · LBMM

UFSC

UFSM

LBMM