Academic Computer Centre Cyfronet AGH ACK Cyfronet AGH
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European Open Science Cloud - EOSC

The European Open Science Cloud (EOSC) is an initiative aimed at creating a virtual environment that fulfills the Open Science paradigm. The EOSC is intended to provide easy and transparent access not only to scientific data, but also to advanced tools and resources for storing, sharing, processing and managing it. They are to be used to conduct effective research, implement innovations and support education, and the recipients of the multidisciplinary environment are European scientists, innovators, entrepreneurs and societies at large. EOSC's data sharing policy is based on the FAIR principles of findability, accessibility, interoperability, and reusability.

Origins of EOSC

The genesis of EOSC can be traced back to the European Commission's 2015 communication, "A Digital Single Market Strategy for Europe", which laid the groundwork for integrating Europe's digital research infrastructure. The initiative gained momentum with the 2016 communication, "European Cloud Initiative – Building a competitive data and knowledge economy in Europe", where the European Commission proposed the creation of the European Open Science Cloud.

In 2017, the EOSC Declaration outlined guiding principles and invited stakeholders to endorse and commit to contributing to the EOSC's development. The implementation phase officially began with the establishment of the EOSC Governance Board and Executive Board in 2018. The EOSC Strategic Implementation Plan and the EOSC Partnership under Horizon Europe are crucial milestones, guiding the initiative from 2021 onwards.

Entities forming EOSC

As an initiative set up to facilitate practical implementation of open science and overall support the whole scientific process in Europe and beyond, it gathers a significant number of important actors and stakeholders:

  • The European Commission: As the driving force behind EOSC, the European Commission provides funding, policy guidelines, and coordination. Key roles are played by the Directorate-General for Research and Innovation (DG RTD) and the Directorate-General for Communications Networks, Content, and Technology (DG CONNECT).
  • The EOSC Association: Established in 2020, the EOSC Association includes research-performing organizations, service providers, and industry representatives. It oversees the strategic implementation and operation of the EOSC ecosystem, ensuring alignment with the European research community's needs.
  • National Governments and Funding Agencies: National governments and funding bodies like the French National Research Agency (ANR) and the German Research Foundation (DFG) offer financial support and policy alignment. They facilitate infrastructure development at the national level.
  • Research and Education Networks (NRENs): Organizations like EGI, EUDAT, OpenAIRE, GÉANT and their technology partners provide the connectivity backbone of EOSC, linking institutions across Europe and enabling seamless data sharing and access to services.
  • Research Infrastructures: Institutions such as CERN, EMBL-EBI, and ESA contribute domain-specific expertise, large-scale datasets, and advanced research tools, ensuring EOSC aligns with cutting-edge scientific needs.
  • Libraries and Data Repositories: Entities like LIBER and university libraries advocate for open access and ensure data repositories comply with FAIR principles. They also support and train researchers to engage effectively with EOSC.
  • Academic and Research Institutions: Universities and research institutions actively contribute data, develop tools, and adopt EOSC infrastructure to enhance research efficiency. They engage in pilot projects and community-building activities.
  • Research Communities and User Groups: Scientific communities, including life sciences (ELIXIR), environmental sciences (ENVRIV, Copernicus), social sciences (CESSDA and many others, drive requirements and service development. Their feedback ensures EOSC remains relevant and valuable to users.

The EOSC projects and Cyfronet’s role

Within EOSC the connections between currently existing research e-infrastructures are made and the integration takes place i.a. by unification of access and authorization rules for researchers from different countries. Thanks to the achievements of EOSC-Hub, belonging to the family of EU-funded EOSC-building projects, a platform was created to do this. The EOSC-Portal is the interface between providers of scientific services and resources and researchers who can benefit not only from the resources themselves, but also from technical support and training. The ACC Cyfronet AGH team played a key role in this regard, becoming the Portal host and developing the Marketplace website, an extensive catalog of services and documentation provided by EOSC partners.

From 2019 to 2021, the EOSC Synergy project was underway to implement EOSC standards for another 9 national e-infrastructures. Cyfronet, in addition to coordinating activities at the national level, supported the planning process by looking for new, effective solutions for integration in other countries.

The following project, EOSC Enhance (2019 to 2022), aimed to improve the Portal in terms of convenience and speed of use. The works carried out by our specialists concerned, among others, advanced analysis of user behavior in order to create and implement the best user experience practices. Thanks to research, interviews and gathering feedback from real users, the Portal was developed, becoming more and more user-friendly. At the same time, new functionalities were implemented to make it easier for researchers to use European research services and open science datasets.
EOSC-Hub, EOSC Synergy and EOSC Enhance were funded by the European Union's Horizon 2020 program.

EOSC Future (2021 - 2024), was a continuation and expansion of the work carried out so far. The project aimed to increase the quality of the EOSC ecosystem for even better support of European science and to encourage scientists to use the resources provided. This goal was pursued through further work on the Portal, integrating more infrastructures and scientific initiatives. In addition, EOSC Future was to ensure the long-term sustainability of EOSC. As part of the project, Cyfronet was responsible for the development of one of the three main components of the Portal: the user-facing part, in particular its elements supporting Marketplace functionality.

The FAIRCORE4EOSC project, which runs from 2022 to 2025, is designed to expand the EOSC infrastructure with components that provide support for the FAIR paradigm. In this case, Cyfronet's role is to provide expert support for data management and personalized search of EOSC resources (including scientific objects) using AI methods (primarily Machine Learning), and to implement the solutions developed in the project in the EOSC User Portal.

Starting in 2024, another project is underway: EOSC Beyond, which aims to provide new solutions for Open Science and tools for science in the context of EOSC by providing new features of the EOSC Core platform. Cyfronet is responsible for providing expert support and solutions for new EOSC functionalities for scientists.

Simultaneously with the development of the Portal and accompanying platforms, EOSC is working on creating transparent rules of cooperation, both with service providers and end users. The creation of formative structures is coordinated by the EOSC Secretariat, within which discussion working groups are created. Their goal is to collect requirements and develop contact forms and procedures.

Activities for the EOSC are being carried out by various teams at ACC Cyfronet AGH, with the Data Processing Laboratory playing a leading role.

More information about EOSC at: https://eosc-portal.eu/.