As of July 2011[update], it included descriptions of 2,228 species, 4,229 pictures, and references to 4,513 works in the scientific literature.
[1] The database is under the supervision of Bernd Ueberschaer at the Leibniz Institute of Marine Sciences in Kiel, Germany.
[2] The data includes information such as identification keys, morphometrics, broodstock, spawning and nursery behaviour, prey and predators, and growth stages and rates.
[2] It can be difficult for fisheries, aquaculture and hatchery scientists and managers to get the information they need on the species that concern them, because the relevant facts can be scattered and buried across numerous journal articles, reports, newsletters and other sources.
[3] An answer to this situation is to consolidate all the available information, drawn from the global sources, into an easily accessed database.