NSF Award
2226414
The MaRCN (Materials research coordination network) will advance and coordinate FAIR data and support Open Science materials research nationally and internationally, bridging the fundamental gap between materials data and data-intensive methods including artificial intelligence and machine learning. The project will build on a range of planning and preparatory activities including the MGI (U.S. Materials Genome Initiative) and MaRDA (Materials Research Data Alliance), a community-based network spanning stakeholders in academia, industry, and publishing. By building on these initiatives to propose ways of advancing materials science to allow data to be leveraged in new ways, the MaRCN will enable the acceleration of materials design and deployment. This project will address multiple national research goals by advancing critical applications in renewable energy and sustainability, health, agriculture, energy storage, quantum computing, and advanced manufacturing.<br/><br/>MaRCN will organize its activities around four over-arching themes: Data, Models, Training, and Impact. Activities undertaken as part of the Data theme include connecting and mediating the needs of data producers, data users, repository users, and publishers to make data deposition and access in trusted repositories the norm. The Models Theme will advance efforts and build community with a particular focus on the domains of electron microscopy and X-ray science. Training Theme activities will encompass a large number of convenings, including focus groups and workshops to seed and grow the network of educators and practitioners fluent in FAIR principles. The Impacts Theme will integrate and maximize the beneficial outcomes of the other themes and actively seek to harmonize the project’s activities with a large number of intersecting organizations with which the project is connected.<br/><br/>This award by the Office of Advanced Cyberinfrastructure is jointly supported by the Directorate for Mathematical and Physical Sciences.<br/><br/>This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.
