Nordic-Baltic Dataverse Hub (NaisH)

Together with five Nordic-Baltic partners, the Danish national research data repository, DeiC Dataverse—operated by the University of Copenhagen—has received funding from NordForsk for a five-year project: the Nordic-Baltic Dataverse Hub (NaisH).

NaisH aims to strengthen and scale research data infrastructure across the Nordic and Baltic regions by further developing and internationalising the Dataverse platform. The focus is on building a reliable and interoperable repository landscape that supports high-quality, FAIR (Findable, Accessible, Interoperable, Reusable) data within the framework of the European Open Science Cloud (EOSC).

The project will bring repositories closer together through shared infrastructure, common standards, and more coordinated ways of working. This includes improving workflows, metadata quality, and daily operations. At the same time, the hub will explore how AI can support practical repository tasks, such as metadata enrichment and data discovery, and how container-based infrastructure can be used to run Dataverse services more consistently across institutions.

Using shared container environments makes it easier to deploy and maintain services across partners. For researchers, this means more stable services, fewer inconsistencies between institutions, and better support for reproducible work.

Transparency, Trust, and Sustainable Operations

A key part of the project is to make repository infrastructure more transparent and trustworthy. NaisH builds on the TRUST principles and the TTRAM framework (Transparency, Traceability, Reproducibility, Accountability, Maintainability).

In practice, this means:

• Clear and visible workflows for how data is handled and curated
• Better tracking of data provenance and version history
• More consistent support for reproducibility through standardised processes
• Defined roles and responsibilities across repositories
• Infrastructure that is maintained with long-term use in mind

For researchers, this gives greater confidence in how their data is managed and reused, and makes it easier to meet requirements from funders and journals.

In concrete terms, the infrastructure work in NaisH supports researchers by:

• Making data easier to find and reuse through better metadata and integration with EOSC
• Reducing manual work through more automated and streamlined workflows
• Improving data quality through shared standards and certification work
• Supporting reproducibility, including through more consistent technical environments (e.g. containers)
• Providing better tools, including AI-supported services where they add value
• Making collaboration easier across institutions and countries

The hub is established by DeiC and the University of Copenhagen together with The Arctic University of Norway (UiT), the University of Iceland (HI), the University of the Faroe Islands (Setur), Riga Stradiņš University, and Kaunas University of Technology. Together, they aim to strengthen the role of the Nordic-Baltic region in international research data infrastructure.

Through the DeiC Dataverse community, all Danish universities are invited to take part in NaisH activities. This includes work on certification, data curation, workflow improvements, and building skills and capacity—contributing to a more sustainable and connected research data infrastructure.