Periodic Reporting for period 1 - R-NMR (Remote NMR (R-NMR): Moving NMR infrastructures to remote access capabilities)
Berichtszeitraum: 2022-07-01 bis 2023-06-30
Nuclear magnetic resonance spectroscopy (NMR) is one of the major analytical method applied in all chemical, physical, biological and medical sciences. Both in academia and in industries, access to NMR equipment is centrally organized in infrastructural units (infrastructures) due to the high costs of capital investments, the level of specialization needed to exploit all aspects in NMR and the technical expertise required to maintain and improve the capabilities of NMR. Prior to Covid19, the overwhelming majority of measurements were conducted and monitored by scientists traveling to NMR infrastructures and setting up experiments on site. Due to the lock-down during the pandemic this scenario was not always possible and our experiences during Covid19 show that remote access is feasible within the field of NMR spectroscopy. Nevertheless, this option is largely underexploited with respect to its potential.
The Remote-NMR (R-NMR) project involves the major European NMR infrastructures operating at the national and international level with the aim to optimize remote access protocols and procedures and achieve its full exploitation. This overall goal is subdivided into five objectives:
O1) Establishing standardized remote access procedures
O2) Establishing common practices to ship scientific samples across Europe
O3) Establishing remote training programs for researchers to prepare for remote use of infrastructure and data analysis
O4) Defining common procedures for FAIR data archiving and dissemination of research protocols
O5) Adopting monitoring tools for CO2 consumption at European NMR infrastructures as the first step towards CO2 footprint reduction.
Fulfillment of these objectives will enable also smaller facilities to offer remote access and thereby allow a much broader user base to profit from using remote access to NMR spectrometers. It will further strengthen the resilience of NMR facilities towards travel restrictions, pandemic waves or temporary lockdown conditions and will achieve a significant reduction of users’ travels, reducing the carbon footprint of the facilities.
The Remote-NMR (R-NMR) project involves the major European NMR infrastructures operating at the national and international level with the aim to optimize remote access protocols and procedures and achieve its full exploitation. This overall goal is subdivided into five objectives:
O1) Establishing standardized remote access procedures
O2) Establishing common practices to ship scientific samples across Europe
O3) Establishing remote training programs for researchers to prepare for remote use of infrastructure and data analysis
O4) Defining common procedures for FAIR data archiving and dissemination of research protocols
O5) Adopting monitoring tools for CO2 consumption at European NMR infrastructures as the first step towards CO2 footprint reduction.
Fulfillment of these objectives will enable also smaller facilities to offer remote access and thereby allow a much broader user base to profit from using remote access to NMR spectrometers. It will further strengthen the resilience of NMR facilities towards travel restrictions, pandemic waves or temporary lockdown conditions and will achieve a significant reduction of users’ travels, reducing the carbon footprint of the facilities.
During the first year of the project we sought to establish the current landscape of remote access implementation in order to identify successful solutions as well as the perceived bottlenecks of the response to the pandemics. To obtain this information, we surveyed NMR facility managers and the community of NMR users. Both surveys were approved by the Ethics Committee of the University of Oxford; replies were anonymous and no sensitive data were collected. We obtained answers from 142 NMR facilities representing 29 countries and from 401 NMR users representing 28 countries, respectively. About the half of the facilities and the half of the users offer/have used remote access. Within the facilities and users that did not offer/use remote access, more than 70% expressed their will to implement/use remote access in the future. Detailed information of the equipment present at the facilities, the heterogeneity of the user community and the procedures for remote access was provided by the survey results.
From the facility perspective, a recurring limitation in the ability to provide remote access systematically is the absence of standard procedures. Such procedures concern mainly access to the network system in a secure and controlled manner, the receipt of samples sent by users, the demonstration of optimal setup of the equipment. Activities aiming at the definition of standard remote access procedures begun at month 6 and are ongoing. As an example, we held an online workshop regarding the use of remote desktop solutions to access NMR spectrometers, with about 100 participants.
The practices for sample shipment were reviewed in an internal survey and from the responses in the user survey. Also in this case, there are no standard operating procedures available for sample shipment starting at the packing of samples, sending, handling them upon arrival, insuring quality control and shipping them back. The results of this review are setting the ground for developing standard procedures during the next half of a year.
Further, a review of GDPR (General Data Protection Requirement) aspects was performed, highlighting the need for the preparation of guidelines for GDPR, which will be addressed during the course of the project.
CO2 consumption data regarding both users travel and operation of the NMR infrastructure itself were collected and a preliminary report was prepared.
From the facility perspective, a recurring limitation in the ability to provide remote access systematically is the absence of standard procedures. Such procedures concern mainly access to the network system in a secure and controlled manner, the receipt of samples sent by users, the demonstration of optimal setup of the equipment. Activities aiming at the definition of standard remote access procedures begun at month 6 and are ongoing. As an example, we held an online workshop regarding the use of remote desktop solutions to access NMR spectrometers, with about 100 participants.
The practices for sample shipment were reviewed in an internal survey and from the responses in the user survey. Also in this case, there are no standard operating procedures available for sample shipment starting at the packing of samples, sending, handling them upon arrival, insuring quality control and shipping them back. The results of this review are setting the ground for developing standard procedures during the next half of a year.
Further, a review of GDPR (General Data Protection Requirement) aspects was performed, highlighting the need for the preparation of guidelines for GDPR, which will be addressed during the course of the project.
CO2 consumption data regarding both users travel and operation of the NMR infrastructure itself were collected and a preliminary report was prepared.
The R-NMR project's primary goal is to encourage a shift from the existing walk-in mode of operation to remote access as a completely comparable method of operation. To achieve this goal, the project collaboration has carefully examined the procedures implemented in European NMR infrastructures during pandemics, compared them with users' experiences, and separately investigated in depth some key issues (GDPR, sample shipment, CO2 consumption).
In order to forward the development of remote access to NMR equipment in a secure, repeatable, legal, and entirely satisfied manner, we identified a number of areas where the creation of shared policies is required.
In order to forward the development of remote access to NMR equipment in a secure, repeatable, legal, and entirely satisfied manner, we identified a number of areas where the creation of shared policies is required.