The Data To Insight Center (D2I) is a research center at Indiana University Bloomington (IUB) for data science and data-driven computing. It is amongst a suite of high quality research and service centers of Pervasive Technology Institute at IUB that leverage the significant cyberinfrastructure at Indiana University for the betterment of society.
D2I was founded in 2009 at Indiana University Bloomington under founding Director, Dr. Beth Plale. Leading up to the founding, and through the last decade, D2I has done pioneering work in data provenance and its role in contributing to more reliable, trustworthy, and shareable research results. Research into effective means for capture and representation of provenance in large-scale scientific applications manifested itself first in the Karma system (2006-2015) and then in the Komadu system (2015-present) (NSF 0721674). In the mid-2000’s Dr. Plale and Dr. Dennis Gannon represented Indiana University in the $11 million NSF funded Linked Environments for Atmospheric Discovery (LEAD) (NSF 0331480) project, which pioneered the concept of science gateways and advanced models for automated metadata capture (NSF 0330613).
D2I successfully incubated the HathiTrust Research Center (HTRC) from 2010-2017 into an independent, cross-institutional entity of the Pervasive Technology Institute. Computer science PhD students affiliated with the Data To Insight Center were instrumental in designing and developing the innovative HTRC’s systems architecture, including the Data Capsules for analysis of restricted data that are still in use today. HTRC startup success is due in part through generous funding from the Lilly Endowment, HathiTrust, the Andrew J. Mellon Foundation, and the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation.
Plale from D2I was one of a dozen founders who founded the Research Data Alliance (RDA). Drawn from the US, EU and Australia, the founders had a passion for sharing research data. The result of their intensive activity over a period of a year is now the now 8000+ member strong international Research Data Alliance (RDA). Through NSF 1349002 and a grant from the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation, D2I ran an RDA student fellowships program (2015-2019). Read more about D2I’s extensive contributions to outreach for data sharing here.