EOSC-Hub

EOSC-Hub
Name	EOSC-Hub
Formation	2017
Type	Research infrastructure project
Headquarters	Geneva
Region served	Europe
Parent organization	European Commission Horizon 2020

EOSC-Hub EOSC-Hub was a major European project created to integrate CERN-based services, European Commission initiatives, and research e-infrastructures into a unified approach for access to digital resources, connecting beneficiaries such as European Space Agency, European Southern Observatory, European Molecular Biology Laboratory, and national research centres across the European Union, United Kingdom, Switzerland, and associated countries. By federating resources from providers including PRACE, GÉANT, and EUDAT, it aimed to support scientists from domains like High Energy Physics, Genomics, Astrophysics, Climate Science, and Materials Science through interoperable services, catalogs, and technical harmonization.

Overview

EOSC-Hub acted as a hub to bring together service providers such as CERN, EMBL-EBI, DANS, SURFsara, CSC, and PSNC with service consumers including research infrastructures like ELIXIR, Instruct-ERIC, CLARIN, and BBMRI-ERIC. It contributed to the emerging European Open Science Cloud ecosystem alongside initiatives such as OpenAIRE, EUDAT CDI, and RDA, while interacting with policy actors like the European Research Council and funding programmes such as Horizon 2020 and successors. The project emphasized FAIR principles associated with GO FAIR and standards developed by bodies like ISO and W3C.

Objectives and Scope

EOSC-Hub's objectives aligned with EU priorities from the European Commission and stakeholders including Science Europe and national research agencies. Key aims included integrating service catalogs from providers such as EGI, GEANT, PRACE, EUDAT, and INDIGO-DataCloud; enabling access mechanisms used by communities like ELIXIR, EPOS, Euro-Argo, and ICOS; and promoting data stewardship models advocated by CERN Open Data Portal, Dryad, and Zenodo. Scope extended to connect infrastructures spanning supercomputing centres like CSCS and HLRS to data repositories such as PANGAEA and EMBL-EBI archives, while ensuring compliance with legal frameworks like the General Data Protection Regulation and standards from CEN.

Services and Technical Infrastructure

The project delivered a service catalog and marketplace integrating tools from providers including Apache Airflow adopters, OpenStack deployments at KIT, CERN OpenStack Servicedesk, and container platforms like Docker and Kubernetes used by PRACE and ELIXIR. Authentication and authorization leveraged federated identity frameworks exemplified by eduGAIN, CILogon, and OpenID Connect, with metadata interoperability informed by schema.org and DCAT vocabularies. Workflow and provenance support referenced technologies and projects such as Galaxy, Nextflow, Worflow4Ever, and PROV-O profiles, while storage and data transfer solutions included iRODS, GridFTP, and Globus nodes hosted at SURFsara and CSC. Monitoring and orchestration relied on practices from ITIL-informed operations and tools used at CERN and GÉANT-connected NRENs.

Governance and Consortium

EOSC-Hub's consortium comprised research organisations, computing centres, and service providers including CERN, GÉANT, EMBL-EBI, DANS, KIT, BSC, PSNC, TRIAGON, and INFN. Governance structures referenced stakeholder groups similar to those in European Open Science Cloud governance dialogues and worked with advisory bodies such as panels from Science Europe and technical coordination with RDA and EOSCpilot collaborators. Management practices followed EU project norms used by Horizon 2020 actions, involving project directors, work package leads drawn from institutions like CERN and EMBL, and legal/compliance input aligned with European Commission frameworks.

Projects, Partnerships, and Impact

EOSC-Hub partnered with thematic infrastructures such as ELIXIR, EPOS, CLARIN, BBMRI-ERIC, and Instruct-ERIC and interacted with cross-disciplinary projects like OpenAIRE-Advance, EUDAT2020, INDIGO-DataCloud, EOSCpilot, and RDA-Europe. Impact examples included enabling data reuse in initiatives linked to Human Brain Project, Square Kilometre Array, LHC collaborations at CERN, and environmental monitoring programmes like Copernicus and European Space Agency missions. The hub supported training and uptake through events co-organised with organisations such as F1000Research, IEEE, ACM, and university partners including University of Cambridge, ETH Zurich, and TU Delft.

Funding and Timeline

Funded primarily under the Horizon 2020 programme and administered by the European Commission, EOSC-Hub ran from 2017 with milestones coordinated with other EU actions, transitioning activities into successor initiatives supported by the European Commission and stakeholders across the European Research Area. Financial oversight followed EU grant management procedures applied across projects like OpenAIRE and EUDAT, and its legacy informed subsequent programmes within the European Open Science Cloud roadmap.

Category:European research infrastructure projects