Biomechanics Data Capture (DC10A)

Overview

This project will develop software for the exclusive use of researchers from the Biomechanics laboratory within the Faculty of Heath and Behavioural Science at the University of Wollongong (UOW). The software will assist researchers to organise data collected from specialised equipment, build meaningful descriptions about the data, permanently store the data/descriptions and publish the descriptions to the Australian Research Data Commons (ARDC).

Background

The Australian National Data Service (ANDS) has provided UOW with funding to build software that assists UOW in data capture, data management and research promotion whilst also achieving the goals of ANDS – increasing discoverability and reusability of Australian research data. Software to manage the data from multiple projects will be built with this funding, involving data collection from a diverse range of participants, using highly specialised laboratory equipment in the biomechanics laboratory.

The ARDC is a searchable database administered by the Australian National Data Service (ANDS) that allows like-minded researchers to search and locate information about the existence of research data sets that may be useful to them. Importantly, the ARDC will not allow public access to the actual data. Instead, requests for access to the data will come directly to the custodian of the data and are subject to ethics approval.

Objectives

This project aims to:
•    Create metadata entries associated with datasets
•    Provide a central storage repository where metadata coupled with raw datasets can be stored.
•    Provide a mechanism whereby collections of data can be defined.
•    Provide a mechanism whereby metadata can be harvested and automatically transported to the ARDC making data collections discoverable within and outside of UOW.

System components

System Specification

The system will consist of a centralised repository for the storage of all data. Access to the data will be managed by a web application and the data stored in a database. Users will be identified through their existing university accounts, using authentication against an LDAP server. The web based application will make use of Adobe Flash™ to upload files, show a progress bar and retrieve files. A database will be used to store metadata associated with data files. The metadata will be searchable and will be used to create ANDS RIF-CS collections.

This project is supported by the Australian National Data Service (ANDS). ANDS is supported by the Australian Government through the National Collaborative Research Infrastructure Strategy Program and the Education Investment Fund (EIF) Super Science Initiative.