Presentation given at Libraries as enablers of Scientific research in Tiblisi on 27th April 2023 #LibrariesTiblisi

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27/04/2023 1
EOSC, Open Science and the role of libraries
www.geant.org
Sarah Jones
EOSC Engagement Manager
sarah.jones@geant.org
Twitter: @sarahroams
Libraries as enablers of scientific research, Tblisi
27th April 2023

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Today’s Topics
• Introduction to European Open Science Cloud
• EOSC as an initiative
• EOSC Association and governance
• Role of libraries in supporting Open Science
• Ideas for libraries and EOSC
Photo by Mike Swigunski

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What is EOSC?
Image: Martin Reisch https://unsplash.com/photos/6DivtP_WRYs

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• Three-party collaboration
• Partnership MOU between EC and
EOSC Association (legal entity) to
govern/oversee the implementation
• Representation of Member States in
Steering Board
• Huge EC investment in infrastructure –
€350 million in initial development
phase and at least €1 billion co-
investment foreseen for next 7 years
Large EC initiative to build an OS solution
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EOSC
Association
Steering
Board
European
Commission

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The EOSC platform
• Building a “web of FAIR data and services”
• Federating data and resources from
eInfrastructure and Research
Infrastructures
• Environment in which data can be brought
together with services to perform analyses
and address societal challenges
https://eosc-portal.eu

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Aims to enable multidisciplinary discovery & use
Disconnected silos to a
federated infrastructure
providing added value to
researchers

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FAIR is central to principles in EOSC
• Is the glue that connects data & services
• Requirement for FAIR to support reuse
• Use community standards
• Share all types of output (openly)

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Many projects and initiatives contributing…

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https://search.marketplace.eosc-portal.eu
Search for data and services on EOSC
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Governance of EOSC
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Photo by Christina @
wocintechchat.com

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What is EOSC Association?
• The legal entity which signed the MOU with the EC in the Partnership Agreement
• A membership organisation to represent the voice of the community
• 168 members and 81 Observers – funders, universities, service providers, publishers…
EOSC Association is part of the governance - not implementation - of EOSC
https://eosc.eu
No Georgian
members
currently…

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• Research funders e.g. DFG, FCT, Science Europe
• Research performing organisations e.g. universities,
institutes, council of rectors..
• Research service providers e.g. NRENs, research
infrastructures, data centres, publishers…
• Other e.g. representative bodies or commercials (LIBER,
EuroCRIS, STM)
https://eosc.eu/general-assembly
Categories of EOSC Association members
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Mandated organisations
• Every MS & AC can mandate one organisation to represent national
interests in the General Assembly
• The Association currently has 26 mandated organisations
• These members have more influence in strategic decisions which require
2/3 majority voting
• Suggested that mandated organisations play a bi-directional role
• Coordinate discussion and views from the country
• Inform members on EOSC and help the Association to grow membership
• Is a legal entity needed in Georgia to represent the community?
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168 Members and 81 Observers
A strong memberbase

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EOSC-A is the voice of the community…
Next General Assembly #6, 22-23 May 2023
Next GA: 22-23 May 2023

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The Purpose of EOSC-A
Incorporation, 29 July 2020
(1) to provide a single voice for the advocacy and
representation of the broader EOSC stakeholder
community;
(2) to promote the alignment of European Union research
policy and priorities with activities coordinated by the
Association;
(3) to enable seamless access to data through interoperable
services that address the entire research data life cycle.

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23 March 2023 by EOSC-A

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EOSC-A Brain-Pool: 13 Task Forces
Implementation of EOSC
• Rules of Participation compliance monitoring
• PID policy and implementation
• Researcher engagement and adoption
Technical challenges on EOSC
• Technical interoperability of data and services
• Infrastructure for quality research software
• AAI Architecture
Metadata and data quality
• Semantic interoperability
• FAIR metrics and data quality
Research careers and curricula
• Data stewardship curricula and career paths
• Research careers, recognition and credit
• Upskilling countries to engage in EOSC
Sustaining EOSC
• Financial sustainability
• Long-term data preservation
Over 400 volunteers

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EOSC-A Task Forces
Deliverables
available on eosc.eu
as well as Zenodo
under
“EOSC Association”

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Role of libraries in
supporting Open Science
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Image: Neil Thomas https://unsplash.com/photos/SIU1Glk6v5k

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Establish institutional RDM services
http://www.dcc.ac.uk/resources/how-
guides/how-develop-rdm-services

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Roles of participants in DCC Institutional Engagements
Libraries are typically leading / coordinating

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Typical activities libraries are involved in
• defining the institutional strategy
• developing RDM policy
• delivering training courses
• helping researchers to write DMPs
• advising on data sharing and citation
• coordinating data stewards
• setting up data repositories
• ...

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DATA SCIENTIST
Curriculum covering:
• Open Science & RDM
• Ethical use of data
• Data analysis
• Data visualisation
• Machine learning
• Computational infrastructure
http://www.codata.org/working-
groups/research-data-science-
summer-schools
Embrace new, emerging job profiles
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DATA STEWARD
Strong programme in Netherlands. Data
stewards have a research background
and provide disciplinary support for
research data management and sharing
https://www.rd-
alliance.org/groups/professionalising-
data-stewardship-ig
RESEARCH SOFTWARE
ENGINEER (RSE)
Term coined to promote career
development and recognition for
those who provide software
development expertise to research
groups. RSEs have coding skills but
also have an understanding of the
research area.
https://rse.ac.uk

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DIY training kit for librarians
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• Resources for self-
learning in groups
• Raise awareness of RDM
• Try out typical support
tasks in exercises
https://zenodo.org/record/653
2050#.Y_5PbOzMK3I

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Delivering RDM services online course
www.futurelearn.com/courses/delivering-research-data-management-services
Learn with us!

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Libraries
and
EOSC
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Photo by Alex Block

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• Register their services (e.g. repositories) via the providers hub
• Expose their data to the EOSC cross-search
• Feed information on data and services into regional catalogues e.g.
NI4OS catalogue
• Advocate for uptake and usage of EOSC by signposting
• Train researchers / help researchers to use EOSC
• Attend events to upskill themselves on EOSC
• ….
Check out training and infographic for libraries from EOSC Future – and
panel session at LIBER in Budapest in July
What do / could libraries do in EOSC?
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• EOSC is working at a huge scale – European and international
• Domain infrastructure (e.g. CESSDA, ELIXIR), national infra and
institutional RDM are just different levels of the “Commons”
• Every level needs to interact via open APIs as far as possible
• What we all need is a basic framework for Open Science that is
pluggable and allows any type of services and data to be compiled
depending on the context and user need.
See RDA Global Open Research Commons Interest Group
A vision for delivering the Open Science Commons (in general)
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At the heart of
building the data
commons is
interoperability and
standards.
Let’s drill into that
layer to think about
how to implement
technically…

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• We all need a core framework to connect all the elements
which need to work together
• This basic open science framework should allow all the
systems, tools, workflows, physcial elements like storage etc
to be brought together in a plug and play way
• It doesn’t matter if those systems/tools/storage etc are
public/free or commercial. The framework has to work with
everything which the user needs
• There should be two way connections between each
element and the framework and between all the elements
so researchers can compile their workflows i.e. pull in what
data, what analysis tools, what storage and compute etc
they need
This is the vision of EOSC
A plug and play OS framework to build any Commons
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Framework:
architecture
platform
basic infra
Tools
Workflows
Storage
Systems
XYZ……

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We are all building commons!
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All of these
Commons need to
interoperate!
Via an open API
layer, series of
protocols,
standards,
schemas,
crosswalks…

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Researchers need to engage with us all!
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Focus on making things work in the context you have
control over. If it works well locally then it will plug into
EOSC in time when everything connects.
Focus on providing meaningful support to researchers.
Please note this is my personal opinion
not EOSC Association or GÉANT endorsed… yet!
Lesson for you in libraries and Georgia in general
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27/04/2023 35
Thank you
www.geant.org
Any questions?
© GÉANT Association on behalf of the GN4 Phase 2 project (GN4-2).
The research leading to these results has received funding from
the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation
programme under Grant Agreement No. 731122 (GN4-2). 35 |