The initiative, funded by the German federal government and the federal states, is coordinated by the non-profit Association Nationale Forschungsdateninfrastruktur (NFDI) e.V., based in Karlsruhe. It aims to systematically provide, manage, and reuse research data as part of Germany's national research data infrastructure.
The mission of NFDI is to ensure that research data is findable, accessible, reusable, and interoperable (FAIR) across disciplines. By improving the management and accessibility of research data, the NFDI enhances research efficiency and quality, fosters collaboration, and ensures that today’s data can be used to answer tomorrow's research questions.
The NFDI serves as an umbrella for multiple consortia. Each focuses on specific domains or interdisciplinary topics, ranging from cultural sciences, social sciences, humanities and engineering to life sciences and natural sciences. These consortia are developing tools and services tailored to the needs of their respective communities, while promoting the development and usage of interdisciplinary standards.
The NFDI is also linked to and participates in the development of international initiatives such as the European Open Science Cloud (EOSC).
GHGA plays an important role in the NFDI, constantly maintaining and strengthening collaboration with consortia in life and biomedical sciences, including NDFI4Health, NDFI4Bioimage, NDFI4Immuno, NDFI4Biodiversity, and NDFI4Microbiota. All these consortia consider omics data as a data modality. GHGA will work closely with NDFI4Health to develop secure and collaborative data analysis solutions for omics using Trusted Research Environments (TREs), particularly for the German National Cohort (NAKO).
Collaborative efforts with NDFI4Health, NDFI4Immuno, and NDFI4Bioimage aim to harmonise metadata schemes, using our expertise in handling sensitive health data. This partnership will also create opportunities for joint activities with the TS4NFDI base service - a cross domain service for the provision, curation, development, harmonisation and mapping of terminologies.
Leading the Task Force Ethics in the NFDI ELSA Section, GHGA addresses ethical issues across NFDI consortia by developing guidelines and training. Additionally, GHGAcontributes to creating fact sheets on FAIR research and data protection within the Task Force Datenschutz (data protection).
In the Assured project, GHGA collaborates with KonsortSWD and BERD@NFDI to develop training and accreditation for scientists handling sensitive research data. With KonsortSWD and NFDI4Health, GHGA also creates concepts for linking and accessing personal data while ensuring privacy. Additionally, GHGA is working with IAM4NFDI to develop legal and data protection concepts for using highly sensitive health data.
GHGA is a founding member of the Geo-Chem-Life Science Helpdesk Cluster, established in March 2025 by ten NFDI consortia to improve interdisciplinary support in the Earth, Chemical, and Life Sciences. By coordinating helpdesk services and sharing expertise, the cluster enhances responses to cross-disciplinary data management queries. GHGA contributes to developing joint workflows and best practices, supporting efficient and integrated user support across domains.
Biomedical research rarely fits neatly into a single discipline and often generates multiple, interrelated data types such as omics, imaging, immunological, and clinical data. Managing these data requires coordinated approaches to ensure FAIR and secure sharing. This is particularly important for sensitive genomic and health data. Containing personal and potentially identifying information requires robust protection, legal compliance, and ethical governance.
The NFDI BioMed Interest Group supports the biomedical research community by aligning standards, metadata and security concepts across domains. While users engage with individual consortia to access domain-specific services, the collaboration between the NFDI consortia provides orientation, training and support. This makes it easier to identify the right consortia for each data type and to manage complex projects without compromising data protection or interoperability.
NFDI4Microbiota supports the microbiology community with access to data, analysis services, data/metadata standards, and training.
NFDI4Immuno provides a comprehensive data hub for immunology-related data with a focus on flow cytometry and adaptive immune receptor repertoire (AIRR)-seq data.
NFDI4Health provides a technical infrastructure and efficient services that make personal health data findable and reusable.
NFDI4BIOIMAGE supports bioimage data management through open formats, flexible infrastructure and everyday data stewardship support.
NFDI BioMed consortia met in Cologne to strengthen collaboration and develop shared approaches for training, services, metadata, and communication for their joint communities.
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Strengthening its development into a robust, sustainable data infrastructure, GHGA is set to expand services, grow its community, and secure long-term integration within the German research system.
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We are excited to announce that the new e-learning platform for ASSURED training is being tested by experts from the research community!
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