Finnish research infrastructures databank opened

Ministry of Education and Culture
Publication date 2.2.2016 9.38
News item

The Finnish research infrastructures databank is now open at http://infras.openscience.fi/. This new service gives information about nationally significant research infrastructures, including facilities, equipment, materials and services that enable research. The information in the databank is in Finnish and English.

The databank is for researchers, research infrastructure service providers and their funders. The aim is to promote the collaborative use of and access to research infrastructures by describing and showcasing them and the services they provide in a unified manner. At the moment the databank contains basic information on the infrastructures: responsible organisations, service descriptions, lifecycle, key words and categories, open access conditions, and contact details.

The Academy of Finland and Ministry of Education and Culture launched the development of the Finnish research infrastructures databank under the Open Science and Research Initiative in 2015. The service is based on the national strategy for research infrastructures adopted in 2014, which sets out a vision that Finland will have gained recognition for its internationally competitive science and high-quality research infrastructures by 2020. To realize this vision long-term development of all research infrastructures, improvements to the access to and collaborative use of these infrastructures, and evaluation of their impact and significance are needed.

The service is still in the pilot phase. Work on its further development continues during 2016 in collaboration among researchers and research infrastructure service providers.