An architecture for creating collaborative semantically capable scientific data sharing infrastructures

ABSTRACT

Increasingly, scientists are seeking to collaborate and share data among themselves. Such sharing is can be readily done by publishing data on the World-Wide Web. Meaningful querying and searching on such data depends upon the availability of accurate and adequate metadata that describes the data and the sources of the data. In this paper, we outline the architecture of an implemented cyber-infrastructure for chemistry that provides tools for users to upload datasets and their metadata to a database. Our proposal combines a two level metadata system with a centralized database repository and analysis tools to create an effective and capable data sharing infrastructure. Our infrastructure is extensible in that it can handle data in different formats and allows different analytic tools to be plugged in.

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INDEX TERMS

Primary Classification:
  H. Information Systems
  H.2 DATABASE MANAGEMENT
      H.2.8 Database applications
          Subjects: Scientific databases

Additional Classification:
  H. Information Systems
  H.3 INFORMATION STORAGE AND RETRIEVAL
      H.3.5 On-line Information Services
          Subjects: Web-based services; Data sharing

General Terms:
Design, Management

Keywords:
architecture for cyber-infrastructures, inter-operation, research dataset integration, scientific databases