The conceptualization of the US Research Software Sustainability Institute (URSSI) just received funding in December 2017 and aims at building the focal point for RSEs in the US similar to SSI in the UK. The Science Gateways Community Institute (SGCI), opened in August 2016, provides free resources, services, experts, and ideas for creating and sustaining science gateways on national and international level. Science gateways – also called virtual research environments or virtual labs – allow science and engineering communities to access shared data, software, computing services, instruments, and other resources specific to their disciplines and use them also in teaching environments. Especially the goals of the workforce development and incubator services have a broad overlap with RSE initiatives to improve career paths of developers and building on-campus developer teams. ACI-REFs (Advanced Cyberinfrastructure Research and Education Facilitators) is a synonym for RSEs and the goal of the project and the trainings aims also at building a network and training the trainers for efficient research software support. The talk will give an overview on the diverse initiatives and highlights the international collaboration possibilities.

1. Award Number
ACI-1547611
Sandra Gesing
Center for Research Computing, University of Notre Dame
sandra.gesing@nd.edu
RSE Leadership Meeting, London, UK
30 January 2018
Research Software Engineers, Science
Gateway Developers and Cyberpractitioners
– Initiatives in the US

2. 2
• In the middle of nowhere of northern Indiana
(1.5 h from Chicago)
• 4 undergraduate colleges
• ~35 research institutes and centers
• ~12,000 students
University of Notre Dame

3. University of Notre Dame

4. Center for Research Computing
• Software development and profiling
• Cyberinfrastructure/science gateway development
• Computational Scientist support
• Collaborative research/
grant development
• System administration/
prototype architectures
• Computational resources:
25,000 cores+
• Storage resources: 3 PB
• National resources (e.g., XSEDE)
• ~40 researchers,
research programmers,
HPC specialists
CRC and OIT building
http://crc.nd.edu CRC HPC Center (old Union Station)

5. 5

6. 6
It’s Research
Software
Engineering
It’s
Postdoc
Work
It’s Research
Programming
It’s
Computational
Research
It’s
Science
Gateway
Development
It’s
Research
Facilitation

7. URSSI: Conceptualizing a US Research
Software Sustainability Institute
7
• PIs: Karthik Ram, Jeffrey Carver, Sandra Gesing,
Daniel S. Katz, Nicholas Weber
• December 2017 – December 2018
• Goals:
• Plan an institute in the context of research software
• Build the community
• Vision of the institute:
• Improve how individuals and teams function
• Improve research software
• Improve the research field itself

8. URSSI Activities and How to Get Involved
8
• Workshops
• First one will be 10-12 April 2018 at Berkeley
• Survey
• in preparation
• Ethnographic studies
• Web site & dissemination
• http://urssi.us/
• https://twitter.com/si2urssi
• Sign up for Newsletter
• Email list
• Support for building US RSE community

9. Science Gateways (VREs and VLs)
9
• Increased complexity of
• today’s research questions
• hardware and software
• skills required
• Greater need for openness
and reproducibility
• Science increasingly driving
policy questions
• Opportunity to integrate
research with teaching
• Better workforce preparation
We need end-to-end
solutions that provide
broad access to
advanced resources
and
allow all to tackle
today’s challenging
science questions
è Science
Gateways

10. Science Gateways Community Institute
10
• Diverse expertise on
demand
• Longer term support
engagements
• Software and visibility
for gateways
• Information exchange in
a community
environment
• Student opportunities
and more stable
career pathshttps://sciencegateways.org/
https://twitter.com/sciencegateways

11. Incubator Service
11
Technology
Planning
• Choosing technologies
• Cybersecurity
• Software engineering
• Interfaces to compute and
data
• Business model development
• Financial planning
• Project management
• Software licensing
• Staff and sustainability
planning
Business Planning
Specialized Expertise
Security
• Center for Trustworthy Scientific
Cyberinfrastructure
Sustainability
• Nancy Maron, creator of the ITHAKA
S+R course on Sustaining Digital
Resources
Evaluation & Impact Measurement
• Ann Zimmerman Consulting
Campus Resource Development
Client Interaction
Planning
• Usability studies
• Web/visual/graphic design
• Impact measurement
• Community engagement
• Support for education
Common Experiences
• Training sessions
• Group interactions
Continuing Engagement
• Customized structure, content, goals
• Mentoring
• Pay It Forward
A Framework for Decision Making
Network / Cohort Formation
An Ongoing
Dispassionate
Ear

12. Sustainability via On-Campus Teams
• Great visibility for the institution’s research
activities
• Synergy effects between projects
• Shared resources, costs and expertise across
departments
• Lower learning curves
• Expertise that is otherwise difficult for individual
projects to obtain
• Ability to retain top-quality research computing
support by providing interesting projects
12

13. Challenges
• Some topics and roles are
only needed for part of the
project
⇒ Not fully funded positions
via one project
⇒ For diverse expertise,
several different people
are needed
13

14. Opportunities
• A breadth of interesting topics in the science
gateway creation process
• Novel frameworks and web applications
• Inter- and multidisciplinary work
• Contributing to grand challenges, e.g., Malaria
eradication
• HPC usage…
• A breadth of interesting roles
• HPC programmers, designers, statisticians, librarians,
machine learning experts, usability experts,…
14

15. Workforce Development
15
Providing Financial Support
• Enabling students learning gateway
skills
• Including internship experiences
Integrating Gateways into Course
Content
• Providing broader access to high-end
resources
Promoting Gateway-
Related Career Paths
• Campus
opportunities
• Job boards
Partners
National Organization for the Professional
Advancement of Black Chemists and
Chemical Engineers (NOBCChE)
Association of Computer/ Information
Sciences and Engineering Departments at
Minority Institutions (ADMI)
Molecular
Science Software
Institute
Google Summer of Code
(GSoC)
Establishing Center for
Training and Education at
ECSU
• Vigorous schedule of on-site and virtual
training
• Development of training and course
curricula about science gateways
technologies
SGCI Institute Areas
4
Focal
Areas
• Student-
related
conference
programs

16. ACI-REF
• Advanced Cyberinfrastructure – Research and
Education Facilitators
16
https://aciref.org/

17. ACI-REF Virtual Residency
• Yearly workshop since 2015
• Intense one-week long
• Hands-on and
presentations
(technical and
soft skills)
• Proposal for
workshop series
underway
17
http://www.oscer.ou.edu/acirefvirtres2017.php

18. Thanks!
18
https://sciencegateways.org/
https://twitter.com/sciencegateways
http://urssi.us/
https://twitter.com/si2urssi
https://aciref.org/
http://www.oscer.ou.edu/
acirefvirtres2017.php