Bologna, February 20 – Today, it has been confirmed that ICSC – Italian Research Center on HPC, Big Data and Quantum Computing has been officially selected as a National Node of the European Open Science Cloud (EOSC).
EOSC, an initiative coordinated by the EOSC Association in collaboration with the European Commission, EU member states, and associated countries, aims to facilitate access to scientific data and promote European growth by federating computing resources, databases, and services for data management and analysis.
The announcement follows a competitive six-month selection process involving over 100 candidate nodes represented by European institutions, during which the ICSC National Center met all necessary requirements. This selection recognizes the strategic role of ICSC in the European landscape of scientific research and technological innovation.
EOSC and ICSC: A Strategic Alignment
EOSC is a key component of the European data strategy, aiming to create by 2025 a unique and integrated digital space to foster Open Science. This will be achieved by facilitating access to computational resources, datasets, and services that support scientific progress and innovation. The planned architecture will consist of a federation of Nodes, Thematic Nodes, and National Nodes, all built on common technological paradigms to implement FAIR principles (Findability, Accessibility, Interoperability, and Reusability) in Open Science.
From a technological and methodological perspective, the EOSC Federation closely resembles ICSC’s distributed infrastructure, which connects HPC and Big Data resources across Italy. These resources will be made available to users across Europe, along with cutting-edge data analysis tools currently under development through an integrated digital platform.
“Beyond demonstrating how our country has not only embraced but even anticipated European directives on technological and digital development,” comments Antonio Zoccoli, President of the ICSC National Center, “today’s announcement is largely due to the expertise built in recent years within ICSC. We have been committed to developing an advanced cloud infrastructure to facilitate data access and management based on Open Science principles. This work has enabled us to build specialized expertise in this field, which contributed to the decision to select ICSC as the Italian EOSC Node.”
ICSC will leverage its expertise and infrastructure to enhance computational and big data management capabilities, providing essential support to Italian and European scientific communities engaged in Open Science.
Strengthening National and European Scientific Collaboration
As the Italian EOSC Node, ICSC will amplify its impact by supporting the national scientific community in adopting FAIR practices and fostering collaborations between academic institutions, research entities, and industry partners for the management and valorization of scientific data.
The decision to apply as the Italian EOSC Node was backed by the Italian Computing and Data Infrastructure (ICDI), which has coordinated Italy’s participation in EOSC since 2018. This initiative is fully aligned with ICSC’s mission, established just two years ago to enable a data-driven value chain to support national growth.
“Today’s achievement will help ICSC advance this mission, providing additional tools to position itself as Italy’s hub for collecting and coordinating resources and services that will be integrated into the European scientific cloud. This also strengthens ICSC’s role as a key player in international science,” concludes Zoccoli.
