Meta knowledge and innovation increasingly takes place at the borders between different domains. It is therefore critical for research fields to think interdisciplinary when tackling new research questions. The German NFDI [1] is in a unique position to foster exchange across research communities in a range of disciplines and subdisciplines. FAIR research data management enables such collaborations by facilitating not only standards, but by establishing a common language among researchers, IT departments, users, funders and industry partners [2]. For example, within Germany`s NFDI three different domains (among others) collaborate with mathematical algorithms, material science taxonomies and research data on tangible and intangible cultural assets like mediaeval church windows or notated music [3].
In this birds of a feather session, we want to kick-start a conversation by:
Using the German NFDI as an example: the 26 domain-specific consortia are developing a research data infrastructure for the respective research areas, and include the development of cross-cutting services and how they encourage cross-disciplinarity.
Collecting concrete examples from other communities/initiatives/projects and focussing on good practice and methodologies to encourage and replicate cross-disciplinary research.
Leading questions of the session will be:
How NFDI and RDA can align, and ensure all respective outputs are leveraged
How the international RDM community can identify mechanisms that promote in-depth collaborations on research questions involving different scientific fields by leveraging RDM as a catalyst.
On a long-term, we aim at:
Initiating a topic-related RDA interest group. This group could discuss which relevant RDA outputs can be reused and how to leverage the RDA community to create pathways to cross-disciplinary work and provide tools.
Interacting with other interest groups that provide substantial guidance for RDM measures that promote FAIRness.
[1] https://www.nfdi.de/?lang=en
[2] Amelung, L., Bodenschatz, E., Danabalan, R., Demandt, É., Depping, R., Eberl, F., Ebert, B., Espinoza, S., Fuchsloch, S., Goedicke, M., Götz, B., Hege, C., Hennig, C., Henzen, C., Hunold, J., Jansen, L., Krieger, U., Rodrigues, C. M., Miller, B., … Zinke, W. (2023). Collaborative work in NFDI. Zenodo. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.8296725
[3] https://nfdi4culture.de/de/nachrichten/interdisciplinary-workshop-between-mardi-nfdi-matwerk-and-nfdi4culture.html
