Publishing a Flatmap as a SPARC Dataset

The source files used in the generation of the flatmaps displayed on the SPARC Portal are stored in version controlled workspaces in the Physiome Model Repository (PMR). See the workspace for the rat flatmap for an example. These source files are used by the Flatmap Maker tools to produce the interactive flatmaps available on the SPARC Portal.

PMR allows users to make an exposure for specific versions of a flatmap workspace (similar to a release). For users with sufficient access, the process of creating an exposure for a flatmap workspace will update that species’ flatmap on the SPARC Portal to the version for which the exposure is being created. Once the exposure has been created, users are able to see a static rendering of the flatmap, as shown below.

Users also have the option to download the flatmap using several different methods. For the purpose of this document, the method of interest is the SDS Dataset Export (as highlighted below). Selecting this download method will provide the user with a ZIP archive containing the flatmap sources structured as per the SPARC Dataset Structure (SDS). Information required before a flatmap workspace can be converted to a SDS dataset is described in the Flatmap Maker documentation.

Having downloaded the SDS archive, users are able to submit the dataset to the SPARC Portal for publication as a new dataset, or a new version of an existing dataset. In doing so, that specific version of the flatmap is made available to the community for future reuse and reference.