A Metadata Model for the Discovery and Exploitation of Scientific Studies

A general model for the representation of scientific study metadata does not exist. The e-Science enablement of the data holdings of CCLRC requires such a model to allow access to the data resources of the facilities in a uniform way. By proposing a model and an implementation, the adoption of such a system would aid interoperability of scientific information systems in the organisation and form a specification of the type and categories of metadata that studies should capture about their investigations and the data they produce inside and outside of CCLRC. This allows further exploitation of scientific Studies and associated datasets, ease citation, facilitate collaboration and allow the easy integration of pre-Grid metadata into a common Grid/e-Science enabled scientific information platform. In this paper, we describe a science metadata model developed at CCLRC, with its motivation, overall design, usage and future development.