ACCESS2ACCESS

ACCESS2ACCESS will design a simpler, fairer, and more sustainable system for researchers to access scientific facilities across Europe. By bringing together 17 leading research organisations, the project addresses a concrete problem faced daily by researchers and facility managers: fragmented, opaque, and unequal access to Europe's research infrastructures (Ris). Funded by the European Union, the project will map existing access schemes, consult researchers and stakeholders at scale, and develop concrete scenarios for a future EU-wide access programme, including governance and long-term funding models. The results will feed directly into EU policy for the next research funding programme, FP10.

A central element of the project is the development of an AI-assisted discovery tool, or "one-stop-shop", that would allow any researcher to describe their scientific problem in plain language and be guided to the most relevant facilities and services across Europe.

The project is designed to be inclusive by default, ensuring that researchers from all scientific disciplines, career stages, and European countries, including Widening Countries will have the chance to shape the future of access to European RIs.

The project will, among other things, deliver:

• a comprehensive map of existing research infrastructure access schemes across Europe
• an extensive analysis of stakeholder expectations from the new access scheme
• a set of policy options for a future EU-wide access programme, including governance and funding models
• an AI-assisted "one-stop-shop" discovery tool for research facility access
• recommendations to ensure Europe's scientific infrastructure is open, discoverable, and accessible to all

Project partners

The ACCESS2ACCESS consortium includes 17 leading European research organisations and 25 supporting partners:

• EURO-BIOIMAGING ERIC
• EUROPEAN SYNCHROTRON RADIATION FACILITY - ESRF
• EUROPEAN X-RAY FREE-ELECTRON LASERFACILITY GMBH
• HELMHOLTZ-ZENTRUM DRESDEN-ROSSENDORF EV
• ANALYSIS AND EXPERIMENTATION ON ECOSYSTEMS ERIC
• ACTRIS ERIC
• BIOBANKS AND BIOMOLECULAR RESOURCES RESEARCH INFRASTRUCTURE - BBMRI ERIC
• INSTRUCT ERIC
• INSTITUT NATIONAL DE RECHERCHE POUR L'AGRICULTURE, L'ALIMENTATION ET L'ENVIRONNEMENT
• ECCSEL ERIC
• ISTITUTO NAZIONALE DI OCEANOGRAFIA E DI GEOFISICA SPERIMENTALE - OGS
• CLARIN ERIC
• PARTNERSHIP FOR ADVANCED COMPUTING IN EUROPE AISBL - PRACE
• CENTRAL EUROPEAN RESEARCH INFRASTRUCTURE CONSORTIUM - CERIC ERIC
• FONDATION EUROPEENNE DE LA SCIENCE
• DEUTSCHES ELEKTRONEN-SYNCHROTRON - DESY
• INESC TEC - INSTITUTO DE ENGENHARIADE SISTEMAS E COMPUTADORES, TECNOLOGIA E CIENCIA
• TILLER ALPHA GmbH
• JRC -JOINT RESEARCH CENTRE- EUROPEAN COMMISSION