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The vocabulary, explained

Gleanloop uses the language of access-and-benefit-sharing precisely, which is not much help if you have never met it. These are working definitions for using this platform — not legal ones.

The flow, in four steps

  1. ListA provider publishes material or sequence data with its consent terms attached.
  2. RequestA consumer states an intended purpose; it is scored against the provider's consent scope before anyone commits.
  3. AgreeOne party proposes terms, the other signs. Two signatures make it active.
  4. TrackPublications, patents, sequence deposits, permits and benefit shares attach to the transaction that authorised them.

Terms you will meet

ABS — Access and benefit-sharing
The principle that a country providing a genetic resource should share in the benefits arising from its use. It is the subject of the Nagoya Protocol, and the reason most of the rest of this page exists.
PIC — Prior informed consent
The provider's agreement, given before access, to someone using their material — and given knowing what it will be used for. On Gleanloop this is captured when a resource is listed, so the consent travels with the listing rather than sitting in a separate file.
Consent scope — What the consent actually permits
The permitted and prohibited uses attached to a listing — research but not commercialisation, say. When a consumer states their intended purpose, it is checked against this before either party commits, and anything outside it is flagged rather than quietly allowed.
MAT — Mutually agreed terms
The negotiated terms of the exchange: what is provided, for what, and what flows back. On Gleanloop one party proposes and the other signs; nothing becomes active on a single signature.
MTA / MoU — Material transfer agreement / memorandum of understanding
Two other instruments the same signing flow supports, for cases where an MTA or an MoU is the appropriate form rather than a MAT.
DSI — Digital sequence information
Sequence data derived from a biological resource. It matters separately because it is not the physical sample: once deposited in a public database such as GenBank, ENA or DDBJ, it cannot be recalled or its downstream use tracked by anyone. Gleanloop records a deposit against the transaction that authorised it; that is a disclosure ledger, not control.
IRCC — Internationally recognised certificate of compliance
The record a country publishes to the ABS Clearing-House when it issues a permit. Gleanloop can cross-check a self-declared permit reference against the real Clearing-House, which tells you whether a matching record exists — not whether the permit covers what someone says it does.
LMO and AIA — Living modified organism / advance informed agreement
A genetically modified organism, and the notification-and-approval procedure an importing country runs before one crosses its border, under the Cartagena Protocol. This is a biosafety question — risk to health and ecosystems — and is separate from benefit-sharing, which is why it has its own reference section here.
Parachute science — Research that takes without crediting
Work on material from a country whose own researchers do not appear as authors. Gleanloop checks published outputs against the resource's origin country and can raise a signal — always a suggestion for a human to confirm or dismiss, never an automatic finding.
Benefit share — What flows back
Monetary (access fees, milestone payments, royalties, licence fees, trust funds or joint ventures) or non-monetary (technology transfer, research collaboration, education and training, data and institutional access, conservation support), following the CBD and Nagoya Protocol. Recorded as owed, then delivered, with an amount, currency and due date where they apply, so the commitment and its fulfilment sit on the same record. Benefits from exchanges outside Gleanloop can be tracked too, on a self-declared disclosure; those are labelled as not verified and never count toward anyone's trust score.

If you hold material

If you need material

Two things worth being clear about

Self-declared means self-declared. Permits, sequence deposits, ethics approvals and off-platform exchanges are stated by the parties. Gleanloop records them and notifies the counterparty. It does not verify them, and it cannot enforce them.

Automated signals are evidence, not verdicts. Anything produced by a model is labelled as such and quotes the text it drew on, so a person can weigh it. Nothing here decides whether someone has complied.

Regulation summaries are our own curation. They are not a live government feed. Check the ABS Clearing-House or the national authority before acting on them.

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