The MaterialDigital (PMD) platform has set itself the goal of systematically and sustainably standardizing materials science data structuring, management and processing in order to enable cooperation between companies and research institutions in this field. This ambitious goal can only succeed if an intensive exchange with future stakeholders and user groups is ensured and their competencies are constantly incorporated.
The funded projects of the BMBF call MaterialDigital are intended to initiate this exchange on the user side. On the one hand, they will help to further develop PMD as a whole, and on the other hand, they will fill PMD with individual content with regard to data, data structures and workflows. The different requirements, areas of expertise and focal points of the submitted projects offer the opportunity to design the PMD for a broad range of applications at an early stage.
However, neither the consortium responsible for the platform nor the individual projects can fulfill this requirement in isolation. The PMD therefore deviates from usual research projects: The individual competencies must also always be geared towards joint advancement, not just towards generating one's own research results. PMD offers the necessary vision, infrastructure as well as starting points on an organizational and technical level for this. However, the implementation will be aimed at as a cooperation on eye level.
To achieve this, attention is paid to "soft" boundaries between the individual projects. This includes lean communication channels, common governance, and the exchange of core competencies for mutual support.
Planned specialist groups in the future will help to involve the community more closely and to continuously develop the platform further.
