Service Stewards play a crucial role in supporting the development and integration of basic services within NFDI. They facilitate collaboration between consortia, partner organizations, and sections, acting as requirement engineers and consolidating information for Base4NFDI, leveraging their domain-specific knowledge. Their role evolves as the process for each basic service advances:
Initialisation Phase: Service Stewards inform ongoing discussions in NFDI sections about basic services and provide information and prototypes of community solutions. They aggregate and monitor needs across consortia, assist in developing proposals, and support evaluation and reporting.
Integration Phase: Service Stewards aid in integrating services into NFDI consortia by securing institutional commitments, ensuring compliance, and arranging training. They assist section working groups in developing proposals, support evaluation and reporting, and supervise service levels while suggesting adjustments when necessary.
See below for all Base4NFDI Service Stewards with domain-specific expertise, which service they oversee and their contact info.
The concept of Service Stewards was also published on Zenodo (Feb 2024).
Contact all Service Stewards via email:
Thomas works as Data Scientist and Full-Stack Software Developer at the German National Library. The last couple of years he gained knowledge in development and integration of Semantic Web technology for the documentation platform of the standardization committee in libraries. With his expertise in software development processes he wants to consult best practices and appropriate procedures within the development of services.
Allocated Basic Service: KGI4NFDI, TS4NFDI
Host Institution: Deutsche Nationalbibliothek, Frankfurt, Leipzig
Area of Expertise: Semantic interoperability and reusability (data harmonization)
Contact:
André is a software engineer specialised in compute and research data projects with comprehensive experience in cloud management in complex scientific infrastructure. In recent years, he supported the integration of services from various domains into existing cloud environments. As a service steward, he wants to ensure that services of federated storage and compute infrastructure find broad acceptance in the individual NFDI consortia.
Allocated Basic Service: Jupyter4NFDI, IAM4NFDI, TS4NFDI
Host Institution: Forschungszentrum Jülich
Area of Expertise: Federated storage- and compute-infrastructure
Contact:
Martin holds a PhD in applied mathematics and computer science and worked as a researcher in signal theory, HPC applications, artificial intelligence and machine learning. During the last years he gained knowledge in Earth observation and big data analytics.
With his experience in research environments, Martin wants to consult scientists and help them. With this they will make use of modern federated infrastructures for storage and computation to achieve and also share their individual results.
Allocated Basic Service: nfdi.software, Jupyter4NFDI
Host Institution: University of Leipzig
Area of Expertise: Federated Access
Contact:
Lisa holds a Bachelor's degree in Language, Literature, and Culture, as well as a Master's in Language and Communication Studies and English. Due to her academic background, she possesses a deep understanding of how language shapes communication, identity, and cultural expression. In addition, Lisa is interested in and experienced with both qualitative and quantitative research methods. Her previous working experience in an academic environment enhanced her organizational, communication and problem-solving-skills, which she wants to use in her role as Service Steward.
Allocated Basic Service: IAM4NFDI, RDMTraining4NFDI
Host Institution: RWTH Aachen
Area of Expertise: Federated Access
Contact:
Jana (B.A. Ethnology, Linguistics) is a Digital Humanities scientist and feels at home both in the analogue and digital world. Her expertise incorporates the whole research data cycle, from digitisation to long-term archiving. As a passionate cultural anthropologist, she is specialised in qualitative research and keeping different perspectives in view. Her work experience involves the facilitation and management of projects (e.g., change management, data protection) in a consulting agency as well as assistance in handling psychological research data for an Open Access publisher.
Allocated Basic Service: PID4NFDI, DMP4NFDI, RDMTraining4NFDI
Host Institution: Leibniz-Institut für Psychologie, Trier
Area of Expertise: Data management, ingest, archival
Contact:
Neelam holds a Master’s degree in Comparative Business Law and an LL.M. in Intellectual Property RIghts. She is a data protection specialist with yearlong experience in data protection consulting. Neelam brings a strong legal foundation and practical expertise to the Base4NFDI team. As a service steward, she supports base services by addressing data privacy concerns, establishing anonymisation requirements, managing risks, and building trust while staying aligned with evolving regulations. Her work ensures compliance while balancing data utility with privacy and fostering stakeholder confidence through a privacy-centric and transparent approach.
Allocated Basic Service: tba
Host Institution: Universität Mannheim
Area of Expertise: Data protection & anonymisation
Contact:
tba
Allocated Basic Service: DMP4NFDI
Host Institution: Humboldt Universität Berlin
Area of Expertise: Data literacy, data management support
Contact: tba