Building Community

The NMDC established support for open science and FAIR (findable, accessible, interoperable, and reusable) data across research teams, publishers, funders, and scientific societies/consortia. We worked towards a sustainability plan that reflected the aspirations articulated in the Interagency Strategic Plan for Microbiome Research (FY2018-2022), and the inherent collaborative nature of microbiome research.

The NMDC welcomed anyone working with microbiome research data to be part of the NMDC community. The cross-cutting nature of microbiome research, from environmental sciences, agriculture, and energy, to human, natural, and built environments, creates a community united by a common challenge – the need for seamless data discovery, exploration, and access. To develop solutions to address this common challenge, the NMDC worked closely with each community to learn and better understand specific needs and questions being explored across the vast array of microbiome research. We had various ways to contribute to our User Research program. 

Through partnering with professional organizations, the NMDC had the opportunity to reach a broad array of researchers, educators, policymakers, and industry collaborators in the microbiome sciences. Partnerships were focused on data standards and community engagement, and worked with our team to share communications and enabled NMDC activities to reach the broader microbiome community.