Robert J. Sandusky
Assistant University Librarian for Information Technology
University of Illinois at Chicago
Sayeed Choudhury
Associate Dean, University Libraries
Johns Hopkins University
DataONE (Data Observation Network for Earth) and the Data Conservancy (DC) are the first two projects funded through the National Science Foundation (NSF) DataNet program. DataONE is a new virtual organization that will enable innovative environmental science through a distributed and sustainable cyberinfrastructure (CI) that meets the needs of science and society for open, persistent, robust, and secure access to well-described and easily discovered earth observational data. This briefing will provide an overview of the CI being developed to support DataONE and related design, consultative, coordination, and governance processes now underway.
The DC embraces a shared vision: scientific data curation is not an end, but rather a means to collect, organize, validate and preserve data to address the grand research challenges that face society. DC will research, design, implement, deploy and sustain data curation infrastructure for cross-disciplinary discovery with an emphasis on observational data. Through collection, preservation and semantic integration of data that are now very difficult to assemble and analyze together, DC will have a transformative impact on the ability of scientists to answer grand challenge questions that are important to the nation and the world. DC initial efforts will emphasize astronomy, earth sciences, life sciences, and social sciences data. This presentation will address the progress to date and first-year deliverables for DC.