The next Level of SBML will be modular, in the sense of having a defined core set of features and optional packages adding features on top of the core. This modular approach means that models can declare which feature-sets they use, and likewise, software tools can declare which packages they support.Apart from the SBML Level 3 Core community is also reviewing several other proposals for optional extension packages such as Layout, Rendering, Multistate multicomponent species, Hierarchical Model Composition, Geometry, Qualitative Models and many more. Nearly all Level 3 activities are currently in the proposal stage.
SBML project started in year 2000 with a small team of researchers dedicated to develop better software infrastructure and standards for computational modeling in systems biology, and after 9 years SBML is supported by more than 170 software making SBML one of the most successful open community based standardization projects in life science domain. SBML project chair Michael Hucka attributes the success of project especially 170 supporting tools to the excellent libSBML library. Actually SBML is a very interesting case study about how open community projects should be organized and executed. SBML Community has not restricted themselves to XML standard only, in fact close collaboration between SBML community members has created the foundation for several sister projects such as Systems Biology Ontology (SBO),BioModels and most notably recently released Systems Biology Graphical Notation (SBGN). The success of SBML also reminds me that whether the community based project have their geographical and cultural advantages or disadvantages.
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