1. Research IT Services to support eHealth
Dr Angus Hearmon,
Head of Research IT & Programme director for Research Lifecycle
5th October 2018
RIT is the central provider of service for Research, we enable research through central services and where appropriate local provision

2. Research Infrastructure Team
Team consists of:
Research Infrastructure Engineers
Database experts
High Performance Computing experts
Research Data Management Consultants
Enabling research via the provision of the dedicated platforms for computational research and storage
Advice on the management of research data, technical and security requirements, solutions etc.
Services aligned with Funder and University policy, as well as third parties e.g., NHS Digital

3. Research Software and Data Engineering Team
“Pool” of professional software engineers and data scientists
Advice on, and specification of, research software requirements
Short- and medium-term support
Applications support
Consultancies
Training
Long-term software engineering support
Can be engaged pre- or post-award
“Pool” of professional software engineers and data scientists
Advice on, and specification of, research software requirements
Help with the software/technical aspects of grants and bid writing including research data management
Can also help with recruiting software engineers into research groups
Short- and medium-term support
Applications support (hours/days)
Consultancies (days/weeks)
Training
Long-term software engineering support
~3 months to n months of effort
Varying levels of FTE (>=20%)
Targeted deployment at certain times within a project
Can be embedded into research groups
Can be engaged pre- or post-award

4. THE RESEARCH LIFECYCLE PROGRAMME
1. Research Foundations (Strategy Delivery)
2. Find Funding (pre-award)
3. Manage Funding (post award)
Set research strategy
Manage partnerships
Find funding
Apply for funding
Secure funding
Manage and close funding
Manage research infrastructure
Workstream 3:
Research Administration
Grouped into three core segments of the lifecycle:
Workstream 1:
e-Research Infrastructure
Workstream 2:
Research Data Lifecycle
Hardware and software;
Resources: data, services, digital libraries;
Communications: protocols, access rights and networks;
And the people and organisational structures needed to support
Covering the four parts of the Research Data Lifecycle:
Data creation and deposit
Managing active data
Data repositories and archives
Data catalogues and registries
Collection
Computation
Analysis
Collaboration
Capturing, storing, managing and discovering research data
Platforms for data and computationally intensive processing
Tools and platforms for data visualisation & analysis
Collaborative research platforms
Platform domains:
With particular attention to:
The publishing of research data
Its link to final research outputs, and
Impact measurement

5. Research Data Lifecycle
Planning
Acquisition
Processing
Analysis
Publishing
Recording
Security & Information Governance
Research Data Management, Research Software Engineers, Research Infrastructure Engineers, Database Experts, HPC Experts, Data Scientists etc
Storage, Applications and other RIT Services

6. Relevant Storage, Applications and other RIT Services
Research Data Storage
Service
Data Safe Haven
Research VM Service
High Performance Computing (HPC)

7. Research Data Storage Service
The UoM’s strategic direction for storage of research outputs.
Dell EMC Isilon Storage
Dual-sited, petabyte-level SAN-based storage architecture
Hosted and administered by IT Services
8TB storage per project free at the point of use
POSF model coming

8. CIR Ecosystem HPC Higher Throughput and Parallel Compute
CSF/DPSF
HPC
Higher Throughput and Parallel Compute
Run hundreds of computations (jobs) at once.
A job can use many CPUs simultaneously
some limited free access to this stuff but also that many researchers contribute financially to increase their capacity on the systems
More Memory
Run bigger jobs - process larger models/datasets
Storage
Lots of resilient, backed-up storage - many, many TB
Virtual Machines (VMs)
Ad-hoc servers (but in a controlled environment) - web servers, DBs, development
The HPC Investment from RLP is going to be added to the CSF backbone to provide a single orchestrated compute platform

9. Data Safe Haven (1)
A secure environment for the management and processing of personal, sensitive and confidential information.
Initially for research projects that need to handle sensitive information in compliance with the NHS IG Toolkit.
Criterion:
All NHS-Digital data users who need to be IGTK compliant, unless there are reasons this cannot proceed will use the DSH.
Other, non NHS-D data users who also need to be IGTK compliant, including section 251 approval will use the safe haven.
Other, non NHS-D data users, where the data is highly sensitive and their security requirements explicitly state the need for a DSH, such as the National Pupils Database.
Defence data.
Research Governance led service.
Initially for NHS Digital data users.

10. Includes secure data transfer, data processing and data storage
Data Safe Haven (2)
Includes secure data transfer, data processing and data storage
Eliminates the need to provide specific, differential assurance within each and every study.
Meets NHS Digital Security requirements.
Benefits:
Secure environment aligned with NHS Digital requirements and the IG Toolkit
Research Governance
Standardised approach
SLSPs
Enabling easier and hopefully speedier data acquisition from NHS Digital
Removing the worry around NHS Digital’s technical requirements

11. REDCap is a mature, secure web application for building and managing online surveys and databases.
Secure service with built-in audit trail that logs all user activity.
Widely used in clinical studies.
Build online surveys and databases quickly.
Easily manage a contact list of survey respondents or create a simple survey link.
Export data to common data analysis packages – Excel, SAS, Stata, R, SPSS etc.
Ad Hoc Reporting – create custom queries for generating reports to view or download.
Built-in project calendar.

12. Interim archiving service.
Researchers can manage their research outputs and move to archive.
Metadata and policy can be added to enable discoverability, re-use, provenance, ownership etc.
Archiving is in alignment with funding bodies policies and retention periods.

13. Research Lifecycle - capabilities
One IT capability
Research IT capability
Research Data Mgmt. capability
Research Admin
University strategy | Research Strategy | IT Strategy and Architecture
Capability requiring investment
Faculty-Research IT Relationship Mgmt. & Governance
LEAD
Research IT Strategy & Architecture
Research Data (and Information) Governance
Management Information
Discovery and Innovation
Tiered Storage
Data Management, and Reporting
High Intensity Computing
Edge Computing
Research Software Development
RSE - Advisory
Disaster Recovery
Metadata Services
Virtual Machines
Flexible Computing
Research Applications Support
Research Software Engineering
Research Data Mgmt.
DELIVER
Computing
Search and Discovery
Data Security Service
Graphics Processing Unit Computing
Technical Infra. Advisory
Tech. Environment Mgmt. – Dev.
Configuration Management
Data Archiving and Preservation
Technical Environment Management - Infrastructure
Data Analytics
Programme and Project Delivery
Service Design and Provisioning
Test, Transition and Integration
Service Operations (Incident, Problem, Change, Request Mgmt.)
Continual Service Improvement
Identity & Access Mgmt.
Networking
Post-publication Impact
Knowledge Management and Collaboration
Commercialisation
Training
ENABLE
Finance for Research-IT
Communication
Procurement
People and Skills

14. Change Project S – Develop service to manage restricted data
Managing restricted and sensitive data is a huge reputational and operational risk to any university. There is an increasing need to ensure that all data is appropriate managed.
Problem statement:
To enable researchers to run projects that handle confidential or personal information that is protected by lay and/or policy and requires the highest levels of access control and security protection whether in storage or transition
Objective for this option:
Based on the requirements, develop a set of standard services and define the implications for roles, including researchers, research data managers and other library staff so that the implementation is supported by training and communication
Setting up controls, services and ongoing monitoring (e.g. data safe pods, safe havens etc.
Implemented in two phases with the second phase addressing additional functionality
Suggested delivery approach and assumptions:
Service set, training and communication resources and controls and monitoring tools
Deliverables:
Compliance with legal and policy requirements…
The key benefits and outcomes:
We are close to appointing a lead for this work and over the next few months they will be looking for input to develop the key use cases for investment
Indicative costs
Delivery timescale
Delivery risk
Risk of not doing this
Type of change
Dependencies
£250K phase 1
Phase 2 dependent Phase 1
6 months
High
High – due to risk of non-compliance
Process and ways of working
Technology and data
People B

15. Thank you for listening!
Research IT Services to support eHealth
Thank you for listening!