BEIJING -- An international alliance to promote biodiversity and health big data sharing was established in Beijing, according to the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS) Monday.

The Global Biodiversity and Health Big Data Alliance, based at the Beijing Institute of Genomics under the CAS, is an organization under a framework initiated by the International Union of Biological Sciences. Founding members are academic institutions from China, Pakistan, Russia, Saudi Arabia and Thailand.

The alliance aims to construct a world-class biodiversity and health big data center containing a variety of data repositories and knowledge bases that are publicly accessible to worldwide communities.

Biodiversity big data includes biological data sets of endangered species, endemic rare species, palaeospecies and economic species.

The alliance will help promote biodiversity research and health industry in China and Asia.