Sensors and data offer unprecedented opportunities to solve societal challenges. To that end, innovation center OnePlanet Research Center is using nanotechnology to develop digital and sensor solutions in the fields of precision agriculture, nutrition and health. Examples include ingestible sensors for monitoring inflammation in the gastrointestinal tract, or so-called digital twins; digital copies of plants, people and cultivation systems, which can predict which interventions are needed, at what time, and what effect they will have.
Info Support and OnePlanet Develop Robust and Scalable Data Platform for Sensor Technology of the Future
The vast amounts of data that these solutions process, combined with the fact that OnePlanet Research Center collaborates extensively with knowledge institutions and companies, fueled the need for a robust and scalable data platform to process and analyze sensor data. This platform needed to be flexible enough to meet the needs of various research teams within OnePlanet.
Info Support and OnePlanet jointly picked up the gauntlet, with the shared ambition of developing a world-class solution that could maximize the impact of sensor technology. In this episode of Business Ahead with IT, Martin van de Goor of Info Support and Jos Kuijpers of OnePlanet talk about the approach and challenges of this project and the key learnings they took from it.
The objectives
Five concrete objectives for the data platform were defined beforehand:
- Streamline and standardize incoming sensor data for reuse
- Storing and unlocking Findable, Accessible, Interoperable, Reusable (FAIR) data for analysis
- Provide support to researchers and data specialists
- Accelerate analytics and time-to-insight for teams
- A future-proof and scalable platform
The approach
At the start of the process, OnePlanet and Info Support considered extensively the use cases, requirements, architecture and technical specifications of the intended platform. OnePlanet brought in-depth knowledge of sensor technology and the specific analyses researchers wanted to perform, Info Support was able to draw on expertise with similar big data platforms in other sectors.
The architecture paid close attention to open standards, connectivity to other systems and FAIR data principles. This was to encourage external reuse and collaboration. Clear agreements were also made regarding security, privacy and scalability.
After six months, the platform could be put into use for the first sensor data streams and analyses.
The results
The platform delivered by OnePlanet and Info Support enables research teams to bring in sensor data in an efficient and standardized way for further analysis.
The new system provides:
- The automatic storage and retrieval of incoming sensor data
- Data quality assurance through metadata, logging and monitoring
- The ability to search, visualize and export datasets for analysis
- Support for external sharing and reuse of FAIR data
- Scalability through cloud-based setup in Azure
The advantages
The data platform provides OnePlanet with several benefits. Collaboration between different research groups at OnePlanet and external partners has become easier. Standards and shared data accelerate experimentation with and scaling up of new sensor applications. Also, users within OnePlanet can perform data analysis faster; data flows are streamlined and data acquisition takes less time. At the management level, the platform provides more grip, visibility and control over the amount of incoming data and ongoing analyses. This increases efficiency and productivity.
Learnings from the collaboration
Throughout the process, both OnePlanet and Info Support have learned lessons from successfully combining expertise in a partnership. A key learning is that investing in a shared architecture vision and platform strategy pays off. This creates synergy and prevents fragmentation. Standards also make exchange and reuse easier over time.
It has also been shown that platform thinking has great potential to increase the focus and speed of innovations. By taking on technology and infrastructures together, R&D teams can fully focus on what they are good at.
By joining forces, a robust platform was delivered in a relatively short time that fully meets the organization’s current needs. The platform is now widely supported within OnePlanet and is already in full use for new research projects. The platform forms a solid basis for expansion with additional data types and advanced analyses such as AI.