Services
Transnational Access to Infrastructure
POLARIN partners operate world-class research infrastructure in the Arctic and Antarctic, which result from a long history of polar research and significant investments made by national polar programmes. For the first time ever, POLARIN provides Transnational Access to a set of complementary and multidisciplinary European and International research infrastructure covering both poles.
POLARIN’s research infrastructure network include:
- 27 Arctic stations.
- 11 Antarctic stations.
- 12 Research vessels including icebreakers.
- 1 deep-sea observatory, 2 observational networks and 15 key observatories associated to research stations.
- 4 Ice and sediment core repositories.
Access to these infrastructures is provided through transnational access, either on-site or remotely, via dedicated public calls throughout the project lifetime. POLARIN’s transnational access programme offers multi-platform access to a wide range of research infrastructures, enabling multidisciplinary projects to integrate data, expertise, and observations across multiple environmental domains.
- 11 Antarctic stations.
- 12 Research vessels including icebreakers.
- 1 deep-sea observatory, 2 observational networks and 15 key observatories associated to research stations.
- 4 Ice and sediment core repositories.
Virtual Access
In the context of POLARIN, Virtual Access (VA) refers to the provision of user-friendly, free of charge, and open online access to services provided by polar research infrastructures including scientific data, metadata, and data services. Currently, POLARIN offers Virtual Access to 7 data infrastructures, 2 observational networks, and 12 research stations.
VA is openly available to all users without a selection process and enables researchers, policymakers, and stakeholders by providing evidence-based information for sustainable management of polar environments, particularly in the context of climate change and human activity impacts.
POLARIN supports VA by connecting data, metadata, data services, and data products from multiple polar research infrastructures through the POLARIN metadata catalogue. This includes the technical and operational work required to host, curate, maintain, and deliver distributed VA resources via a common access point (the POLARIN metadata catalogue), and to ensure that these resources remain discoverable, interoperable, reliable, and usable throughout the project lifetime. VA funding may therefore be used to support efforts to integrate new or previously unpublished datasets with the POLARIN metadata catalogue and the operational costs of the VA data repositories to ensure effective and sustained delivery of these services to users throughout the project lifetime.
Datasets and services provided through VA are integrated into the POLARIN metadata catalogue and exposed through the POLARIN Data Hub, ensuring discoverability, accessibility, and reusability in line with FAIR principles, and enabling the monitoring of access in accordance with Horizon Europe requirements.
Virtual Access Materials:
POLARIN webinar on Provision of Virtual Access (VA) for POLARIN Research Infrastructures (RIs). The webinar focuses on how RIs can provide user-friendly, free, and open online access to scientific data, metadata, and data services, aligning with POLARIN’s mission to enhance data discoverability, interoperability, and reuse.
Training
POLARIN develops training programmes to ensure that early career researchers, professionals and research infrastructure (RI) users are able to fully exploit the services that the RIs are offering.
The POLARIN Training Programme focuses on three key areas:
- a series of online seminars and other training resources to teach current and futures users of RIs on how to plan their field work campaigns/cruises, to optimally use the scientific equipment and to act in a sustainable way. - a training programme on data management and data processing (data stewardship) . - a safety training under polar conditions compliant with the Polar Code, to equip PIs of polar expeditions are able to deal with emergency situations.
A dedicated training programme on data management and data processing (data stewardship) will complement this training. In addition, POLARIN will implement a safety training under polar conditions compliant with the Polar Code, to ensure that PIs of polar expeditions are able to deal with emergency situations.
Training Materials:
POLARIN fieldwork planning webinar on Planning Polar Fieldwork. This webinar provide information on how to navigate permit processes and logistics challenges, understand risk assessment and field safety, implement ethical and sustainable research practices, and plan effective data management from the start.
- a series of online seminars and other training resources to teach current and futures users of RIs on how to plan their field work campaigns/cruises, to optimally use the scientific equipment and to act in a sustainable way.
- a training programme on data management and data processing (data stewardship) .
- a safety training under polar conditions compliant with the Polar Code, to equip PIs of polar expeditions are able to deal with emergency situations.
Training Materials:
POLARIN fieldwork planning webinar on Planning Polar Fieldwork. This webinar provide information on how to navigate permit processes and logistics challenges, understand risk assessment and field safety, implement ethical and sustainable research practices, and plan effective data management from the start.
POLARIN Data Hub - Data Access and services
POLARIN invests on improving the consumption of data towards the reduction of the data landscape fragmentation. To do so, POLARIN aims to provide improved access to polar data by harmonising data management standards and workflows covering the complete life cycle of data from acquisition to long-term archiving.
Access to metadata, data and data services is offered free of charge to users, through a single-entry portal, the POLARIN Data Hub.
POLARIN Data Hub Materials:
- Article: The POLARIN Data Hub: Connecting Data and Science in the Polar Regions The article provides an overview of the POLARIN Data Hub aims towards open access polar data.
- Article: The POLARIN Data Hub: Connecting Data and Science in the Polar Regions The article provides an overview of the POLARIN Data Hub aims towards open access polar data.