About

Overview

The MERIL (Mapping of the European Research Infrastructure Landscape) portal provides access to a database that stores information about openly accessible research infrastructures (RIs) in Europe, across all scientific domains, including the social sciences and humanities.

The MERIL database is a dynamic resource that is being continuously populated.

MERIL data consists of lists of identified, eligible RIs, and a set of data for each individual RI, collected and displayed in a standardised format.

The MERIL public portal is an open access resource displaying available information that has been collected with input from European Member States and Associated Countries, and the RI scientific community. The information is quality-checked by the MERIL Team.

Currently MERIL has ~900 identified RIs, and ~600 of them have completed profile pages and are visible on the public portal.

Team

The MERIL-2 project is coordinated by the European Science Foundation (ESF), which is also responsible for the data collection, management and project communication.

The National Documentation Centre in Athens (EKT) is responsible for the IT development of the MERIL web portal and database.

The Agency for the Promotion of European Research (APRE) is in charge of liaising with RI National Contact Points (NCP) networks and the policy-making community.

The MERIL-2 project is advised by a high-level MERIL Advisory Committee (MAC) composed of representatives from national ministries, research funding organisations, research performing organisations and the science community.

MERIL interacts with a broad community of stakeholders that includes the RI scientific community, the European Commission, ESFRI, and other RI-related initiatives and projects.

Background

MERIL was initiated by the ESF Member Organisation Forum on Research Infrastructures in 2010, following the identification by national research funding and performing organizations of a need to build an inventory of existing RIs on the national and European levels, both as a baseline for policy-making and as a valuable source of information for scientists.

The report of the MO Forum, "Research Infrastructures in the European Research Area" (2013), gives an overview of the aims, activities, conclusions and results of the Forum, including the definition of quality standards and basic requirements for research infrastructures. These quality standards are represented in the criteria used to determine RI eligibility for inclusion in the MERIL portal.

The MERIL project was supported by the European Commission under Framework Programme 7 - Contract # 262159 between October 2010 and December 2012. Between 2013 and March 2016 it was supported by the ESF member organisations. Since March 2016, the MERIL-2 project is supported by the European Commission under Horizon 2020 – Contract # 654296 for a duration of three years.