Dear readers,

Connecting knowledge, supporting digital research: With our newsletter digital››forschen, we keep you up to date on digital services at our university and affiliated institutions.

This newsletter is edited by the newly established Digital Research Services department at University IT Services. As the successor to the Competence Center Digital Research (zedif), we now support research processes with a holistic approach — providing both advisory services and technical support.

Following the tradition of previous zedif newsletters, we are pleased to present our current workshop program and provide updates on our projects as well as topics from the field of digital research.

Furthermore, we invite you to participate in our mini-survey to let us know which additional services you would like to see from us in the future.

We hope you enjoy this issue and wish you a successful start to the summer semester!

Your Digital Research Services Team

Since the beginning of the year, the new Digital Research Services department — the successor to zedif — has been consolidating central IT services for research directly within University IT Services (URZ). Through our integration into the URZ, we offer comprehensive support: from subject-specific consulting and practical training to active assistance for technical development work in your projects and the needs-based expansion of research-related IT infrastructure.

Our core services for your research include:

• Research Data Management: Strategic consulting across the entire data lifecycle, as well as the provision of infrastructure for the digital documentation of research projects and the long-term storage of research data.

• Scientific Computing & AI: Operation of high-performance computers for computationally intensive research projects, for applications in the field of artificial intelligence, and of environments for interactive analysis. Support for the efficient use of these systems in research projects.

• Digital Services & Software Engineering: Assistance for the selection, use, and custom development of research software, alongside the provision of common software solutions and development tools.

If you have any questions about our services, please visit our website or contact us at any time via the Service Desk or by email.

We look forward to hearing from you.

During the summer semester, the University Computer Center offers a range of courses that teach basic knowledge and skills in digital tools, research data management, and programming.

This semester we are offering the following courses:

• Introduction to the Command Line
• Basic Version Control with Git: A Beginner’s Workshop
• Version Control and Project Management with GitLab
• two courses “Introduction to Programming with Python”: beginning of June and end of June
• First Hands-on Experience with an HPC Cluster
• Research Data Management – Make your data count!
• HPC Package Management with Nix

All details about the courses and registration can be found in our catalogue within the Qualification Portal. The courses are open for all members and students of scientific institutes in Jena. The course language is generally English.

If you have any ideas or wishes for further courses, feel free to contact us.

With NOMAD Oasis, the University Computer Centre is testing and evaluating a new research data platform and electronic lab notebook for materials science since February 2026, available at https://nomad.test.hs-itz.de/nomad-oasis/gui/. NOMAD Oasis provides structured and FAIR data management for materials science and related disciplines through semi-automatic analysis and standardisation of measurement and raw data. The data that can be processed by NOMAD can also be extended through a plugin system and customised to individual needs, for example to support new measurement devices. NOMAD covers the entire data lifecycle and enables private data storage, sharing with collaboration partners, embargo periods for datasets, and publication of datasets to the central instance at https://nomad-lab.eu.

The University of Jena NOMAD distribution, including the definition of capabilities and plugins, is maintained in a Git repository at https://git.uni-jena.de/nomad/nomad-oasis. Code contributions, feature requests, and support enquiries are very welcome there.

https://nomad.test.hs-itz.de/nomad-oasis/gui/ is still in the testing phase. Feedback is expressly welcome and can be submitted in the form of a GitLab ticket. In the longer term, the service is intended to be offered across Thuringia through the IT Centre of Thuringian Higher Education Institutions with expanded capacity.

Extensive introductory materials for NOMAD are available at https://nomad-lab.eu/nomad-lab/tutorials.html.

In the coming months, a range of events on digitalization and data science will take place at Friedrich Schiller University Jena, where you can meet representatives of the Digital Research Services division as well as the Thuringian Competence Network for Research Data Management (TKFDM).

Data Science Day Jena | May 6, 2026 | 1:00 – 7:30 PM

On May 6, 2026, the Data Science Day will take place for the eighth time, organized by the Institute of Computer Science. The event features an informative program of talks as well as an industry symposium and, as in previous years, brings together data science experts from academia and industry. The TKFDM will be represented with an exhibition booth. Visitors can learn more about TKFDM events, services and projects, and can explore practical materials such as RDM checklists, handouts, and the card game “Research Data Scary Tales”. The event can be attended via live stream or in person. Registration is open until May 3, 2026.

Forum Digitale Universität Jena | June 1–2, 2026 | 9:00 AM – 4:00 PM

This year marks the first edition of the Forum Digitale Universität Jena, organized by the Office for Digital Transformation. The event focuses on “Digital skills for studying, teaching, research, and professional practice.” The forum consists of two parts: an online day on June 1, 2026, featuring keynote impulses, mini tutorials, and workshops, and an in-person day on June 2, 2026, with a World Café and exhibition booths. The Digital Research Services division and TKFDM will not only be present with a booth but will also contribute to the online program with sessions on the following topics: documenting experiments using the electronic lab notebook eLabFTW, encrypting files and folders, and automated transcription and AI chat with your own data. The full program and registration details will be available soon here.

We look forward to meeting you at one of these events and to engaging in conversation with you.

The Thuringian Competence Network for Research Data Management (TKFDM) continues its successful Online Coffee Lecture series in April 2026.

This semester, the series is held under the theme „Best Practices – Warum das Rad neu erfinden?“ and presents practical tools and templates. Topics range from data organization and knowledge management with Obsidian to open-source tools for everyday research — so there is something for everyone. A special highlight is the Coffee Lecture by the State Commissioner for Data Protection and Freedom of Information, Tino Melzer, which will take place in June.

The Coffee Lectures are held online via Zoom on the last Wednesday of each month (except August) at 2:00 PM. Participation is free of charge. Grab a cup of coffee or tea and join us virtually! Registration and further information can be found on the Coffee Lectures Homepage of the TKFDM.

The TKFDM offers permanent access to all Coffee Lecture materials of the past years. Recordings of all events are available on the TKFDM YouTube channel, while the presentation slides can be found on zenodo.

Jena is a hub of scientific excellence, renowned for its outstanding research and high-performance research infrastructure. Since 2021, JenaVersum has been specifically designed to promote the coordinated and networked use of these resources. The “JenaVersum 2023–2026” project continues this approach with a focus on transparency, efficient resource allocation, and new opportunities for collaboration. The central tool is the open-source platform OpenIRIS.

Following a successful pilot phase and two user days, the community is growing steadily. More and more institutions are making their equipment visible, thereby strengthening the networked research landscape in Jena.

With the 3rd OpenIRIS User Day for JenaVersum, we would like to once again offer you a platform for information, exchange, and networking. The event is aimed at current users as well as interested parties and specifically supports the strengthening of collaborations within the JenaVersum network. In addition, you will gain insights into current developments and future prospects for the OpenIRIS platform. In the inspiring setting of the OpenIRIS provider “Lichtwerkstatt” at the Abbe Center of Photonics, we look forward to engaging in dialogue with you and discussing how research infrastructures can be shared, utilized, and further developed even more effectively. We look forward to receiving many registrations and engaging in a diverse exchange of ideas.

The National Research Data Infrastructure (German: Nationale Forschungsdateninfrastruktur (NFDI)) presents its consortia in an overview published on Zenodo (in German only). These consortia develop discipline-specific infrastructure, tools, and services for various research fields. All primary scientific disciplines are covered and a large number of institutions are involved in the NFDI consortia. The publication provides an overview of the 26 discipline-specific consortia, as well as the joint initiative Base4NFDI. Each consortium is presented on a single page in a concise, standardised profile format. This allows you to quickly and easily find the consortium that suits your field and discover what it has to offer. It’s well worth a look!

In October 2025, the German Research Foundation (DFG) announced a new funding initiative aimed at preserving secure endangered data repositories and strengthening data resilience.

Between 2025 and approximately 2027, the DFG will provide funding to enhance the resilience of data infrastructures and to secure endangered data repositories and research results from foreign repositories, making them permanently accessible to the German research community. The initiative supports projects that, for example, build storage capacities, provide personnel resources for data acquisition, curation, or subject-specific processing, address legal issues, or promote the integration of secured data into national and European structures. Funding may also be provided for the development of frameworks and technologies that enable better integration of relevant repositories and infrastructures into supraregional or European networks and cloud environments.

More information about the new funding initiative and the application procedure can be found on the DFG website. There you will also find the first four projects that have already been approved as part of the funding initiative.

The Department of Digital Research Services provides comprehensive support in the planning and proposal preparation process – from aligning your project idea with the funding call and selecting suitable storage and infrastructure solutions to addressing questions of research data management and technical implementation. Feel free to contact us if you are planning to submit a proposal to the DFG and arrange an appointment with us via email at urz-dfs@uni-jena.de.

A research data centre (RDC) is an institution that archives and processes research data over the long term and makes them available to the scientific community via regulated access channels in compliance with data protection regulations. In doing so, research data centres act as data custodians. The primary role of RDCs is to ensure compliance with data protection regulations and to provide qualitative and/or quantitative research data. Researchers can access freely available datasets directly or, following an application and user agreements, gain access to sensitive data.

Research data centres in the social, behavioural, educational and economic sciences are accredited by the RatSWD (German Data Forum) and thus meet minimum quality standards. There are currently 39 RDCs accredited by the RatSWD with different thematic focuses (e.g. education, migration, health, politics, economics, finance). They may be located at government agencies or at academic institutions.

The FDZ Gesundheit, which has not yet been accredited, was recently opened. It contains pseudonymised data from the statutory health insurance, which are made available for research purposes upon request.

Many research data centres also accept external data. If you are considering to make your sensitive data available via a research data centre, we recommend contacting one at an early stage: They can advise you on data collection, quality requirements, and costs.

Feel free to contact us with any questions you may have regarding the publication or use of data from the research data centres!

What additional services (tools, consulting, development, training) related to digital research would you like to see the Digital Research Services department offer in the future?

➡️ Answer