The Science Clusters play a key role in linking Europe's Research Infrastructures to the European Open Science Cloud (EOSC). Each cluster brings together the research infrastructures within a specific domain: Astronomy and Particle Physics, Environmental Sciences, Life Sciences, Neutron and Light Sources, and Social Sciences and Humanities.
The Science Clusters serve as vital conduits, connecting scientific communities, their infrastructures, and EOSC to foster the future of European science. The clusters help Research Infrastructures to communicate their needs, methods, and workflows to the EOSC. At the same time, the clusters help the EOSC in promoting the continued development of an Open Science culture in Europe and beyond. They do this by supporting collaboration among the Research Infrastructures, and enabling them to exchange knowledge and technologies, share data and jointly develop thematic services.
The Science Clusters invite scientific communities to come together and improve science in Europe and make it more competitive by creating and supporting interdisciplinary projects and ideas, and connecting scientific communities. As an example, data management practices that enable their interoperability will be established by connecting the respective data catalogues across disciplines.
The Science Clusters are uniquely positioned to address the challenges facing scientific communities that are promoting open research data and data federation, because they simultaneously represent data producers and consumers. The joint work programme of the Science Clusters falls into three main areas:
- Stimulate Open Science practices, cross-domain interoperability, and long-term coordination among the scientific communities involved. Researchers benefit by improved access to data, tools, and resources, leading to new insights and innovation in data-driven science both within and beyond the context of the domains in which the clusters are rooted.
- Create a cross-border open innovation environment for the FAIR (Findable, Accessible, Interoperable, and Reusable) data management of economies of scale, which allows the development of synergies and increases the efficiency and productivity of researchers by encouraging the application of open-science standards and the use of thematic services.
- Drive co-development to foster the cross-domain interoperability that is central to achieving the EOSC goals. This includes developing the long-term role of the five Science Clusters to add relevant content to the EOSC and to enhance researchers’ involvement in Open Science. It also involves working closely with the EOSC Association to ensure that the EOSC strategy, implementation roadmap, and governance address the thematic needs of scientific communities.