The Research Data Alliance (RDA) is a global forum that is helping to build social and technical bridges to make it possible to share research data around the world. Several regions are participating in the RDA, including Europe. RDA Europe is a group that supports European regional interests and participation in the RDA. This article gives an overview of the recent developments in both the RDA and RDA Europe.
The Research Data Alliance is currently working hard to become a legal entity. These efforts are being led by John Wood (Secretary General of the Association of Commonwealth Universities) and will result in the RDA being established as a charity under UK law. The legal documents for this are in the process of being finalized, and are based foremost on the governance document https://www.rd-alliance.org/filedepot?cid=132&fid=108.
In September this year, the RDA held its very successful second plenary conference. Keynotes from John Willbanks and Carole Palmer were followed by the required business meetings on the first day. On the second and third days, the focus of the meeting was on the work being undertaken by the working groups and interest groups. The meeting concluded with a presentation of the progress made by these groups – details can be found here: https://www.rd-alliance.org/sites/default/files/attachment/Breakout_reports.pdf.
At the second plenary meeting, the new council members were also introduced. This brings the complete RDA council to seven members now: Fran Berman, Patrick Cocquet, Tony Hey, Kay Raseroka, Doris Wedlich, Ross Wilkinson, and John Wood.
This year’s plenary also heralded the start of the Technical Advisory Board(TAB) election, which has since then run its course and resulted in eleven members being appointed to the TAB. Of the initial eleven people, six were elected and will serve for two years. The European elected members are Susanna-Assunta Sansone, Jamie Shiers and Rainer Stotzka. The other five, which include Françoise Genova and Peter Wittenburg, have been appointed by the council and will serve for one year, after which they will be replaced by election.
In parallel with this, RDA Europe has been, and will be, supporting regional interest and participation in the global RDA efforts. In preparation for the last RDA plenary, RDA Europe organized a one-day workshop at the RZG in Munich. The workshop featured ample time for discussion, as well as talks on relevant non-RDA matters by Stefan Winkler-Nees, Andreas Rauber, Wolfram Horstmann, and Germán Cancio. The workshop concluded with a discussion on the upcoming H2020 framework led by Kostas Glinos and Carlos Morais-Pires.
RDA Europe is also organizing other activities to support sharing research data globally. These activities include a travel support program that uses a very lightweight funding scheme and is intended to enable more researchers to attend the third RDA Third Plenary Meeting which will be held on 26-28 March 2014 in Dublin, Ireland. Furthermore, RDA Europe is organizing a science workshop series in order to become more aware of the needs of the scientists in respect to data sharing.
