Physical Sciences Data Infrastructure (PSDI)

This presentation was delivered at the Birds-of-a-Feather (BoF) session on Harnessing automation and AI tools to advance data curation and connect digital research infrastructures on Wednesday 7 October 2026 at the @resdatall Research Data Alliance (RDA) 27th Plenary Meeting (RDA P27) in London 👉 t.ly/Wv7OI Jointly organized by the Physical Sciences Data Infrastructure (PSDI), the @ccdc_cambridge - The Cambridge Crystallographic Data Centre, and the DCC @digitalcuration the BoF session brought together several different digital research infrastructures (#DRIs) and created a forum for knowledge exchange about their current practices, challenges, and opportunities with regard to automation and the use of artificial intelligence (#AI) in the curation of research data. 🔗 Link to the presentation: t.ly/Wv7OI

⭐ PSDI Resource Spotlight: TopoStats and AFMDB: Resources for Atomic Force Microscopy (AFM) Image Analysis ⭐ 🔬 The #TopoStats tool enables the batch processing of #AFM datafiles to obtain rich, quantitative statistics and is developed with the FAIR principles for research software in mind: t.ly/ToPoS 🔬 The #AFMDB, provides a platform for the sharing of AFM datafiles, along with processed images, to encourage open data practices: t.ly/AFMDB If you wish to learn more about TopoStats and AFMDB toolkits, we have an upcoming webinar for you 👉 t.ly/4RsCS Dr Thomas Catley will be taking the session. He is a Research Associate in Single Molecule Microscopy and DNA Biophysics and is currently leading a collaboration with PSDI to develop TopoStats capabilities for materials science applications, alongside AFMDB. We look forward to your participation! 👋

The PSDI Showcase & Conference 2026 is now free to attend! 🎉 t.ly/uEMuq ⭐️️ We are providing limited financial assistance for accommodation and travel. Apply here: t.ly/IbqL_ 📅 25 & 26 November 2026 ⏰️ 12:00 pm - 3:30 pm 📌 Leonardo Royal Hotel Southampton Grand Harbour 🎟️ Register here: t.ly/uEMuq Registration closes on 9th November 2026

Mitochondria is the powerhouse of the cell, and Sharkcat is the powerhouse of PSDI! And Sharkcat would like to invite you to attend the PSDI Conference & Showcase 2026 👉 t.ly/fHhld Join researchers, data professionals, infrastructure providers and policymakers for two days of insights, networking and collaboration in Southampton, Leonardo Royal Hotel Southampton Grand Harbour, 25-26 November 2026 Bursary available for entrance fee, accommodation and travel 👉 t.ly/RSaeR

PSDI Collaborator Spotlight! ✨ @digitalcuration Centre ✨ The future of research hinges on our ability to curate and preserve exceptional data. Initiatives such as the collaboration between DCC and PSDI exemplify this commitment. Through the shared creation of resources, training, and events like our Forum for Librarians and Research Support Professionals in Research Data for the Physical Sciences and our workshop on Creating Communities Around Best Practices and Common Challenges in Data for the DCC’s International Digital Curation Conference, we aim to drive progress in data stewardship. Together, these efforts lay the groundwork for addressing some of the most complex scientific challenges of our time. ⭐ Here are a few upcoming events from the DCC that you should definitely check out: 👉 21st International Digital Curation Conference: t.ly/pHSvI 👉 Self-assessing research data management and FAIR-enabling capabilities: t.ly/2WLo0

Don't wait for the last moment to book you place for the PSDI Showcase Event 2026! Click here to register: t.ly/iquN4 ⭐ Details: Date: 25th - 26th November 2026 Time: 12:00 pm - 3:30 pm Venue: Leonardo Royal Hotel Southampton Grand Harbour Price: £50 📍Please note that financial assistance may be available to cover the event fee and support your attendance at this PSDI showcase. 📍This is only available to UK applicants and there is limited funding available. 📍If you would like to apply for this please complete this form and the team will get back to you as soon as possible: t.ly/xPpJr

The PSDI Showcase will take place on 25–26 November 2026 at Leonardo Royal Hotel Southampton Grand Harbour, West Quay Road, Southampton SO15 1AG. Please complete this form to be considered for a financial support to to cover the event fee and support your attendance for the PSDI Showcase 2026 👉 t.ly/xPpJr Bursaries are primarily intended to support early career researchers and people facing barriers to event participation. Please note, that this is only available to UK applicants and there is limited funding available.

The Physical Sciences Data Infrastructure (PSDI) Showcase Event 2026 is here! Have you booked your place yet 👉 t.ly/iquN4 📅 Dates of Event: 25th November 2026 – 26th November 2026 🚨 Last Booking Date for this Event: 9th November 2026 🎟️ Event fee: £50.00 The Showcase will provide an opportunity to explore the latest PSDI developments, discover new tools, services and datasets, share experiences across the community, and contribute to discussions that will help shape the future direction of PSDI. Hear from last year's attendees about the Showcase 2025! Don't wait to book your place as spots are filling in fast 🏃🏻💨 👉 t.ly/iquN4 #PSDI #PSDIShowcase #PhysicalScience #Researchers #Academics #ai #dataservices #datatools #community

Presentation by Dr Samantha Pearman-Kanza, PhD on "Building the Foundations for #AI-Ready Science: Data, Knowledge and Digital Laboratories" for the AstraZeneca's Predictive Science, Digitalisation & #Automation (PSDA) group 👉 t.ly/yp5o4 This talk provided an accessible introduction to the foundations of scientific data management and explore how #digitalisation can help transform fragmented scientific records into connected, reusable, and machine-readable research assets.

In late August 2026, Dr Samantha Pearman-Kanza, had the wonderful opportunity to attend the 10th Chemical Sciences & Society Symposium (CS3) on Data Science for Chemistry: t.ly/vFU_Q This event brought together leading researchers from the UK, Germany, China and Japan to discuss how the chemical sciences can help to tackle some of the most daunting challenges that our world faces. Samantha formed part of the UK delegation, alongside Andrew Shore & Ale Palermo FRSC (Royal Society of Chemistry), Samuel Alcorn (EPSRC), Kim Jelfs (Imperial College London), Richard Bourne (University of Leeds), Tony Bristow (AstraZeneca) and Julien Michel (The University of Edinburgh).

We are delighted to announce that registration is now open for the PSDI Showcase 2026. 🎉 📅 25-26 November 2026 📍 Leonardo Royal Hotel Southampton 🎟️ Register now: t.ly/iquN4 The PSDI Showcase is our flagship community event, bringing together researchers, data professionals, software engineers, infrastructure providers, funders, policymakers, and industry partners from across the UK physical sciences landscape. This year's Showcase will provide a unique opportunity to explore how data, digital infrastructure, and AI are transforming physical sciences research. See you there? 👋 Book your spot 👉 t.ly/rEL__ #PSDI #PSDIShowcase2026 #PhysicalSciences #researchers #academic #UK #UKevent #ai #research #digitalinfrastructure #community #DataStewards #DataManager #DataLibrarian

Open Repositories for Chemistry and Energy Systems - Engaging the flow battery community to raise electrochemical testing standards - PSDI Webinar by Dr Josh J. Bailey and Hugh O'Connor Download the PDF here: t.ly/jSzwl

Standard Reporting of the Uncertainty in Reaction Yield Applied to a CO2 Transfer Reaction 👉 t.ly/En5Jz Dimitrios-Ioannis Tzaras, Grace Beaver, Jazmine Thorne, Katherine Marris, Danny Ryder, Gregory Perry, Sally Bloodworth - School of Chemistry & Chemical Engineering, University of Southampton

The Physical Sciences Data Infrastructure (PSDI), the @ccdc_cambridge - The Cambridge Crystallographic Data Centre, and the @digitalcuration (DCC) are jointly hosting an online session focused on the role of PSDI in supporting best practices, and addressing challenges & opportunities, in data curation in physical sciences in the UK 👉 t.ly/48qJG 📅 Date: Wednesday 23 September 🕘 Time: 2:00 – 3:00 pm (UTC+1) 📍 Location: Online (zoom) – t.ly/oTIG9

Standard Reporting of the Uncertainty in Reaction Yield Applied to a CO2 Transfer Reaction 👉 t.ly/En5Jz Dimitrios-Ioannis Tzaras, Grace Beaver, Jazmine T. Thorne, Katherine Elizabeth Marris, Daniel J. Ryder-Mahoney, Gregory J. P. Perry, Sally Bloodworth

Atomic Force Microscopy Database (AFMDB) 👉 t.ly/3VkUD By making these datasets openly available, #AFMDB supports good data sharing practices and provides high quality, standardised examples that can be used to train and evaluate deep learning methods for enhanced AFM analysis. Researchers are encouraged to contribute AFM data from their publications and to test #TopoStats, helping refine the tool through community feedback. We also have an upcoming webinar, by Dr Thomas Catley, showcasing AFM Reader, TopoStats, and the AFM Database, which together support automated analysis, open data practices, and the development of next-generation AI methods for AFM research 👉 t.ly/wpHaQ (22nd October 2026)

The paper, by Malin Zollner, presenting the Physical Sciences Data Infrastructure (PSDI) BenchmarkSet1500 has now been published! Link to the paper 👉 t.ly/3X1mG BenchmarkSet1500 provides a curated dataset of 1,581 organic semiconductor molecules, including excited-state energies and oscillator strengths calculated using multireference quantum-chemical methods. A major aim of this work was to make high-quality multireference excited-state data more accessible. The dataset supports method benchmarking, theory-level selection, application-oriented screening and machine-learning research for excited-state properties.

If you have an AFM paper or AFM related journal idea, please send a short abstract to [email protected] to receive an invite. More details & Manuscript submission here: t.ly/k3yYP The goal of this article collection is to advance #AFM research by positioning high-quality, reusable datasets as integral scientific outputs. Authors are encouraged to make associated datasets openly available through one of two options: 👉 Authors can utilize the FAIR2 DATA Direct Submission: t.ly/hRoA2 👉 Authors can utilize the PSDI Community Data Collection: t.ly/Gd99E @FrontiersIn

If you have an #AFM paper or AFM related journal idea, please send a short abstract to [email protected] to receive an invite. This article collection welcomes submissions across the broad spectrum of AFM applications, including #MaterialsScience, #nanobiology, #nanoelectronics, #nanofabrication, and surface characterization. Contributions may include Original Research Articles, Brief Research Reports, Methods papers, Reviews, or Perspectives that present new scientific insights, methodological developments, or critical evaluations of current practices in AFM research and data management. Dates to keep in mind: 📝 Abstract deadline: 16th September 2026 📇 Manuscript submission deadline: 4th January 2027 🔗 Link to the article collection page: t.ly/k3yYP @FrontiersIn

📰 Hot off the press, our ELN Whitepaper by Dr. Samantha Pearman-Kanza, PhD and Dr. Matthew Partridge has been published: t.ly/T7kIH This whitepaper provides practical guidance for chemistry departments considering implementing or maintaining an ELN. It draws on experience from the School of Chemistry & Chemical Engineering, University of Southampton ELN implementation programme, alongside wider engagement with the ELN, research data and digital research infrastructure communities. Particular acknowledgements go to Mark Goulding, Jonathan Hirst, Andrew Hector, Simon Coles, Jeremy Frey and the ELNFinder team!