Three Australian eResearch providers are banding together to create services for 10 national communities researching fields including climate, medical, terrestrial and marine environments, culture and genomics.

The joint partnership between the Australian National Data Service (ANDS), National eResearch Collaboration Tools and Resources (Nectar) and Research Data Services (RDS) will benefit from an initial $5 million in seed funding.

Of that, “over” $4.3 million has been earmarked for the ‘research community’ projects.

These bring together previously disparate resources from the three providers in the hope of “directly enhancing the researcher user experience by improving their abilities to use and manage their data”.

Researchers in those ‘communities’ will also have the ability to run simulations in a digital, virtual environment.

“We’re trying to make it easier for researchers to engage with the services we provide and are therefore harmonising our processes,” RDS director Ian Duncan said.

"This is new investment into Australia’s research future, and a new way of doing things for us,” ANDS executive director Ross Wilkinson said.

“Researchers want a more joined-up, cohesive experience, and that is exactly what this joint funding will provide.

“RDS, ANDS and Nectar are working together at every level of our organisations to support Australian research.”

Nectar director Glenn Moloney said that the integration of data from new machines “married with clinical trials and a robust library of data” could help medical researchers create precision approaches to personalise medicine.

“This is only possible when data is assembled and able to be used by researchers in novel ways,” he said.

“The research communities we work with have complex needs. The combined cloud and data resources we have assembled through these projects are greater than the sum of the parts.”

The remaining $700,000 is to be used by the three providers to fund the creation of a data lifecycle framework “that will connect research infrastructure components to improve the efficiency and effectiveness of Australia’s research data.”

All three eResearch providers are federally funded though the National Collaborative Research Infrastructure Strategy (NCRIS).