NFDI Podcast with Peter Pelz

As part of the NFDI podcast our Speaker Peter Pelz goes deeper into research data management in engineering and talks about Data literacy as key to digital sovereignty.

Data literacy as the key to digital sovereignty – Why we should all be more like Scrooge McDuck

This episode is about nothing less than the foundation of digital science: data literacy. Prof. Dr.-Ing. Peter Pelz (TU Darmstadt) explains why data preparation is more important than any AI model, what data literacy education looks like in practice – and why good scientific practice cannot function without good data management. With plenty of plain language, illustrative examples (Lego, washing machines, Raspberry Pi) and a clear appeal: Those who understand data shape the future – in research, business and society.

Topics covered in this episode:

  • Digital literacy from the very beginning: Why data literacy should start in the first semester – and how curricula can be made future-proof through practical projects, e.g. with Raspberry Pi or Lego CO₂ balances.
  • Data sovereignty is a matter of education: Who owns our data? Why is it risky to give it away unknowingly? And how can students learn to handle data in an appreciative, confident and responsible manner?
  • From treasure trove to data powerhouse: Data is not there to be hoarded – it needs to flow. How FAIR data pipelines are built and why standards, semantics and metadata are central to collaborative research.
  • Infrastructure for all – Coscine & Co.: How projects such as Coscine (RWTH Aachen University) and Jupyter Notebook access (University of Stuttgart) create technical solutions for effective research data management – open, modular and user-friendly.
  • Governance & standards – the basis for sustainable data spaces: What is a ‘FAIR data product’? Why are linguistically defined standards for machine-readable information necessary? And how do information models such as SPEED help with approval, sustainability and production?
  • Research meets industry – the example of REUNION: How modular production facilities in the pharmaceutical industry can be approved more quickly thanks to standardised data models – and why this is changing not only medicine but also small and medium-sized enterprises.

The episode is now live and available on multiple platforms:

NFDI podcast
The NFDI podcast focuses on activities of the NFDI consortia and on FAIR research data management. It covers topics such as data sovereignty, AI, ethics and forward-looking technologies.