COOPEUS

Building a Framework for a Sustainable, Transatlantic Cooperation in the Field of Environmental Research Infrastructures

INFRA-2012-3.1 International cooperation with the USA on common data policies and standards relevant to global research infrastructures in the environment field

Co-ordinator: Dr. Christoph Waldmann, MARUM

Participants:
University of Bremen- MARUM, Centre for Marine Environmental SciencesUni Bremen, Germany
Istituto Nazionale di Geofisica e Vulcanologica, Rome, Italy
EISCAT Scientific Association,Sweden
Laboratoire des Sciences du Climat et de L´Environment, LSCE/CEA, Paris, France
CSIC Spanish Council for Scientific Research, Sevilla, Spain
Royal Netherlands Meterological Institut KNMI,The Netherlands
Finnish Meteorological Institute/Ilmatieteen laitos FMI, Finland
University of Tuscia UNITUS, Italy
University of Washington UW, USA
Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution WHOI, USA
Irish Marine Institute MI, Irland
Scripps Institution of Oceanography SIO, USA
 
Short synopsis of planned COOPEUS Coordination Action

Developing world-class research infrastructures for environmental research is therefore one of the priorities of European authorities. This proposal brings together scientists and users being involved in Europe’s major environmental related research infrastructure projects, i.e. EISCAT, EPOS, LifeWATCH, EMSO, and ICOS, with their US counterparts that are responsible for the NSF funded projects AMISR, EARTHSCOPE, DataONE, OOI and NEON. The intention is that by interlinking these activities new synergies are generated that will stimulate the creation of a truly global integration of existing infrastructures.

The kernel of this integration process will be the efficient access to and the open sharing of data and information produced by the environmental research infrastructures. This important crosscutting infrastructure category is subject to rapid changes, driven almost entirely outside the field of environmental sciences. Trends in this area include growing collaborations between computer and environmental scientists, leading to the emergence of a new class of scientific activity structured around networked access to observational information. Therefore links to running projects like ENVRI in Europe or EARTHCUBE in the US who are developing relevant architectures are indispensable.
Considering this perspective the COOPEUS project will serve as a testbed for new standards and methods. Interoperability and the development of e-infrastructures for the environmental ESFRI projects should not just deal with data but should also include the tools that scientist use for analyzing the data. The new term that describes this new quality in cooperation is “interworkability” which means that it not just machines benefit from the interoperability paradigm but that this concept is extended to the exchange of concepts between individual scientists.

The COOPEUS project will act as an incubation chamber for new sustainable concepts in this field and also will act as a playground for completely new approaches. The above listed objectives of COOPEUS can be summarized in the following activities:
1. Ensure a larger harmonization and interoperability between research infrastructures across communities and crossing borders
2. Exploit synergies between existing initiatives
3. Optimize technological implementation by making use of evolving concepts in e-infrastructures

The COOPEUS project is planned to run for three years, starting in 2012. It will consist mainly of coordination activities, like workshops, exchange of best practice, case studies and formulation of roadmaps for future joint experiments. It is anticipated that there is cross participation in meeting of high level staff between the EC and US research infrastructures on a regular base.