Astronomy Librarians Roles and the Unified Astronomy Thesaurus

The Unified Astronomy Thesaurus (UAT) is an open, interoperable, community thesaurus that organizes astronomy concepts and their relationships into a single high-quality resource. It provides a common vocabulary for search and discovery and shared descriptions of datasets, scientific literature, etc. The UAT is designed to enhance semantic enrichment of the scholarly literature, improving how astronomical research is indexed, searched, and shared. The American Astronomy Society (AAS) in June 2024 created the Working Group on the Unified Astronomy Thesaurus (WGUAT) to manage, maintain, and improve this resource. The WGUAT is a collaborative effort of individuals with varied skillsets, including librarians, astronomers, publishers, and data scientists. Its activities are focused on expanding and refining the taxonomy, making technical improvements, creating staffing options, and producing informational materials. We expect that the UAT will be further enhanced and updated through a synergestic effort involving broad community participation. As more publishers utilize this resource and the resource is further refined, its usage and importance to the astronomy field will increase. Astronomy librarians will play an expanding and vital role in the future of the UAT in the areas in which they provide value: contributing to the taxonomy, advocating for users' needs, and connecting users with the resource.