NFDI is currently creating a permanent digital repository of knowledge in Germany. In his LIfBi Lecture, York Sure-Vetter began by explaining what he considered to be the important observation that today more and more research results are being achieved through the use of existing research data. However, he said, considerable effort is still required to find the right data set in each case, to understand it, and to use it for the purpose in question. Accordingly, the goal of NFDI is to increase the efficiency of the entire German science system - across all disciplines - by establishing and further developing an overarching research data management system. Under the motto "Standing on the shoulders of giants", important research data should be made permanently available to the entire scientific community through NFDI according to the FAIR principles (Findable, Accessible, Interoperable, Reusable). This is particularly important because existing research data can be better used that way for new research questions, findings and innovations.

History and organization of the NFDI         

As part of his LIfBi Lecture, York Sure-Vetter also looked back at the history of NFDI's development to date: The Council for Information Infrastructures (RfII) provided the impetus for its founding with its recommendation in 2016, followed by an initial phase at the Leibniz Institute for Information Infrastructure and the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology, during which consortia - i.e., associations of different institutions within a research field - were formed. In 2020, the non-profit association Nationale Forschungsdateninfrastruktur (NFDI) e.V., based in Karlsruhe, was founded to coordinate the activities for establishing a National Research Data Infrastructure. Within the association, there are now so-called sections, which serve the cross-disciplinary collaboration of the consortia in terms of content.

On a national level, the NFDI association is embedded in a network of actors from science and politics. It is also part of international developments and projects, for example the European Open Science Cloud (EOSC) or the FAIR-Data Spaces project.

Prerequisites, challenges and opportunities

In the discussion that followed the LIfBi Lecture, the participants exchanged views on the potentials that overarching research data management opens up, its necessary prerequisites, and the challenges and opportunities that arise from bringing together numerous data sets from different disciplines.

Link [external] to the association National Research Data Infrastructure (NFDI) e.V.