Kerk Kee is a senior personnel member on the National Science Foundation-funded center.
Published July 27, 2021
Texas Tech Today
In 2018, a team of researchers from institutions across the U.S. came together to launch a pilot program aimed at creating a model for a cyberinfrastructure (CI) center of excellence for the National Science Foundation's (NSF) major facilities (MFs), which are generally intended to serve the science community that is critical to supporting innovation across the nation. The goal was to identify how the center could serve as a forum for the exchange of cyberinfrastructure knowledge across varying fields and facilities, establish best practices for different NSF major facilities' cyberinfrastructure, provide CI expertise and address CI workforce development and sustainability.
Now, with a new NSF award, the pilot program has begun phase two and become CI Center of Excellence: CI Compass, an NSF Center of Excellence dedicated to navigating the major facilities' data lifecycle. CI Compass will apply its three years of initial evaluation and analyses for an improved cyberinfrastructure as needed for the NSF's major facilities.
Kerk Kee, an associate professor of professional communication in Texas Tech University's College of Media & Communication, is serving as a senior personnel member for the project.
“CI Compass will serve as the hub for knowledge sharing between and across NSF major facilities, and the broader cyberinfrastructure community, about technical solutions and best practices,” Kee said. “At the heart of knowledge sharing is the inter-organizational communication and cross-disciplinary collaborations that will lead to scientific discoveries and impactful innovations in our society.”
CI Compass will enhance the overall NSF CI ecosystem by providing expertise where needed to enhance and evolve the MF CI, capturing and disseminating CI knowledge and best practices that power MF scientific breakthroughs, and brokering connections to enable knowledge sharing between and across MF CI professionals and the broader CI community.
