Conference: Support for MERIF Workshop 2023

Research infrastructure projects aim to develop advanced research facilities and provide broad access to research infrastructures to the community to conduct cutting-edge research. Over the years, multiple research infrastructure projects in NSF's Computer and Information Science and Engineering (CISE), which can be considered in the mid-scale range, have been awarded; they are in different stages of their life cycles. Some earlier funded projects (CloudLab, Chameleon, Colosseum) are relatively mature with a stable user base, eager to explore how to do cross-platform experimentation with newer projects. Other available platforms (such as FABRIC, SAGE, COSMOS, POWDER, AERPAW) have relatively newer components in the infrastructure and strive to expand their research user base. The Midscale Experimental Research Infrastructure Forum (MERIF) plans to hold a MERIF Workshop on May 22-24, 2023 in Boston, MA, to bring together above-mentioned research infrastructure providers and research users to share experience and improve infrastructure to support science and engineering research. The workshop is intended to help recruit additional researchers who can make highest and best use of the current midscale research infrastructure facilities through raising community awareness, reducing barriers to use, sharing best practices, and facilitating cross-facility research. The workshop will also include training opportunities for students from diverse backgrounds to learn how to use various platforms to conduct research. Further information about the workshop is available at http://merif.org This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.