Where Lego Meets FAIR Data

WHERE LEGO® MEETS FAIR DATA Mariarita de Luca, Federica Bazzocchi, Area Science Park OpenAire RDM Bootcamp, 16th October 2025 Research Institute for Technological Innovation (RIT) Three laboratories implementing an integrated data ecosystem where data are collected, managed and analyzed. They provide open-access knowledge and services aimed at supporting experimental testing as well as applied and industrial research projects. LABORATORY of GENOMICS AND EPIGENOMICS LAGE LABORATORY of ELECTRON MICROSCOPY LAME LABORATORY of DATA ENGINEERING LADE DATA INFRASTRUCTURE DATA MANGEMENT AND CURATION DATA SCIENCE AREA SCIENCE PARK (TRIESTE) DATA STRUCURED AND USTRUCTURED Images generated with AI STRUCTURED DATA UNSTRUCTURED DATA RESEARCH PROJECT and RAW DATA Millennium Falcon MANUAL LEGO Set 75192-1 Millennium Falcon (2017 Star Wars > Ultimate Collector Series) | Rebrickable - Build with LEGO Door SangyaPundir - Eigen werk, CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=53414062 FAIR PRINCIPLES Wilkinson, M., Dumontier, M., Aalbersberg, I. et al. The FAIR Guiding Principles for scientific data management and stewardship. Sci Data 3, 160018 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1038/sdata.2016.18 8 Data are growing faster than ever. The real challenge is not their quantity, but our capacity to manage them responsibly Specific train on FAIR data management aims at providing the skills to turn this challenge into opportunity F A I R principles These high-level FAIR Guiding Principles precede implementation choices, and do not suggest any specific technology, standard, or implementation-solution; Moreover, the Principles are not, themselves, a standard or a specification. They act as a guide to data publishers and stewards to assist them in evaluating whether their particular implementation choices are rendering their digital research artefacts Findable, Accessible, Interoperable, and Reusable. Wilkinson, M., Dumontier, M., Aalbersberg, I. et al. The FAIR Guiding Principles for scientific data management and stewardship. Sci Data 3, 160018 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1038/sdata.2016.18 Picture from «The Turing Way» 10.5281/zenodo.3332807 FAIR principles apply during all the phases of the Research data lifecycle D E S I G N & P L A N N I N G S H A R E & R E U S E P R O C E S S I N G & A N A L Y S I S C O L L E C T & C R E A T E Project proposal Project approved DMP draft Resource planning High level policies Coaching guidance Data retrieval Data type Scripts algorithms Storage backup Metadata standards Data organization Raw data & Active Analysis Ready data Workflows Quality control Data preserve Provenance Version control Data sharing Code sharing IP & IPR Licenses Metadata sharing Bongaerts, N., & Della Chiesa, S. (2022). Research Data Management Lifecycle (2.0). Zenodo. https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.6602006 MDMC is designed to The fundamental principles of reproducibility FAIR DATA MANAGEMENT is not a bureucratic burden FAIR can be seen as the thecnical implementation of the scientific method HOW LEGO® MEET DATA MANAGEMENT? What we have called characteristics are metadata (data about data) of our raw data (LEGO® components) By choosing and assigning a hierarchy at characteristics we induced a metadata schema EXAMPLE OF LEGO® CLASSIFICATION EXAMPLE OF LEGO® CLASSIFICATION We have two strategies to make a dataset FAIR… •analyzing the content and structure •defining and choosing a semantic model, •enriching the recoverable metadata • transforming it into an open and linkable format •assigning licenses. FAIRification GO FAIR framework 0 20 40 60 80 100 120 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90 100 110 120 130 140 150 time spent Produce the data Images generated by AI •Planning the structure •Planning the ingestion •defining and choosing a semantic model, •Planning how to collect metadata • how to transform data into an open and linkable format •choosing licenses FAIR-by-design Implement the pipeline Images generated byAI 0 20 40 60 80 100 120 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90 100 110 120 130 140 150 time spent Great strategy for well managed and curated FAIR data may lead to great achivements!!! AN OFFICIAL LEGO® REPOSITORY PART Rebrickable | Rebrickable - Build with LEGO MODEL= SHAPE+ DECORATION 4 digit number + letters&code part_num name 3004pr0050 Brick 1 x 2 with 2 Pearl Gold Lines (V -Neck Shirt), Medium Lavender Triangle print COLOR Id_color decoded OUR CONTACTS ✓Website: MDMC - SISSA ✓Available OPEN material: MDMC - Zenodo ✓Git repository: MDMC – GitHub ✓Email : [email protected] MDMC INFORMATION and LINKS [email protected] [email protected]