CatRIS (Catalogue of Research Infrastructure Services) is a new project funded by the European Union's Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme, and its main objective is to map the needs of individual groups and users of Research Infrastructure (RI) services. CatRIs will build an online catalogue of European RI services, with particular emphasis on physical infrastructures. To drive this goal and build a dynamic catalogue that answers users’ needs, CatRIS is running an open consultation process calling all members of the RI ecosystem to participate in an online survey until 19 April 2019.
The CatRIS project, which was launched in Strasbourg on 25 January 2019, focuses on collecting and disseminating information relating to services made available by European Research Infrastructures. Information will be accessible via an online portal primarily targeting potential service users - researchers, research organisations and companies as well as a wider range of stakeholders (policy makers, funders etc) in the Research Infrastructures ecosystem.
The survey results will help to identify the current needs of users, which will be taken into account when determining the methodology for cataloguing the RI Service and the development of the functionalities of the portal.
The portal will interact with European infrastructures and directories, such as the European Science Open Cloud (EOSC), while drawing expertise from other projects that gather information for RI, such as Meril and eInfraCentral. The new portal will help increase the visibility of RI services, improving usability and their impact, as well as promoting European and international partnerships.
The success of CatRIS depends on its integration into the European landscape of RI and its connection to the community, including infrastructure managers, scientists from academic, research and industrial sectors, policy makers and funders.
Co-ordinated by the European Science Foundation (ESF), CatRIS involves the participation of seven organisations from four countries: European Future Innovation System Centre (EFIS Centre), Core Technologies For Life Sciences (CTLS), the JNP Group, European Centre for Information on Marine Science and Technology (Eurocean), National and Kapodistrian University of Athens (NKUA) and National Documentation Centre (EKT/NHRF).
As a project partner, the National Documentation Centre (EKT/NHRF) will implement the following actions: a) Development of Web Application Programming Interface (Web APIs) web portal to ensure the interoperability of the EOSC with third party systems and applications, b) Contribution to the analysis of requirements and the design of the portal, c) Contribution to the taxonomy development and conceptual model to describe Research Infrastructure Services.