CRC806-Database: A semantic e-Science infrastructure for an interdisciplinary research centre

Well designed information infrastructure improves the conduct of research, and can connect researchers and projects across disciplines to facilitate collaboration. The topic of this thesis is the design and development of an information infrastructure for a large interdisciplinary research project, the DFG-funded Collaborative Research Centre 806 (CRC 806). Under the name CRC806-Database the presented infrastructure was developed in the frame of the subproject "Z2: Data Management and Data Services", a so-called INF project, which is responsible for the research data management within a DFG funded CRC. During the design, development and implementation of the CRC806-Database, the complex requirements for sound data management in the context of a large interdisciplinary research project were considered theoretically, as well as practically during the implementation. The presented infrastructure design is mainly based on the requirements for research data management in CRC's, that is mainly the secure storage of primary research data for at least ten years, as well as on the further recommendations, that are about support and improvement of research and facilitation of Web-based collaboration, for information infrastructure by the DFG. The CRC806-Database semantic e-Science infrastructure consists of three main components, i.) the CRC806-RDM component that implements the research data management, including a data catalog and a publication database, ii.) the CRC806-SDI component that provides a Spatial Data Infrastructure (SDI) for Web-based management of spatial data, and additionally, iii.) the CRC806-KB component that implements a collaborative virtual research environment and knowledgebase. From a technical perspective, the infrastructure is based on the application of existing Open Source Software (OSS) solutions, that were customized to adapt to the specific requirements were necessary. The main OSS products that were applied for the development of the CRC806-Database are; Typo3, CKAN, GeoNode and Semantic MediaWiki. As integrative technical and theoretical basis of the infrastructure, the concept of Semantic e-Science was implemented. The term e-Science refers to a scientific paradigm that describes computationally intensive science carried out in networked environments. The prefix "Semantic" extends this concept with the application of Semantic Web technologies. A further applied conceptual basis for the development of CRC806-Database, is known under the name "Open Science", that includes the concepts of "Open Access", "Open Data" and "Open Methodology". These concepts have been implemented for the CRC806-Database semantic e-Science infrastructure, as described in the course of this thesis