EMPHASIS Preparatory Phase

The Preparatory Phase of EMPHASIS is a H2020 supported project EMPHASIS-PREP (Grant Agreement number 739514). The project started in 2017 to bring EMPHASIS to the level of legal, financial, and technical maturity required for implementation. EMPHASIS-PREP provides the basis for the establishment of the legal framework, the business plan and the preparation of an information system for a sustainable and innovative pan-European infrastructure for plant phenotyping.

EMPHASIS as a sustainable pan-European Research Infrastructure will fill an important gap in the Health & Food ESFRI landscape.

See project information on CORDIS

Deliverables

EMPHASIS-PREP Objectives

The Preparatory Phase of EMPHASIS is organised by the EU-funded project EMPHASIS-PREP. The activities carried out include in particular the characterisation of the plant phenotyping infrastructure  in Europe, the identification of gaps in infrastructures including information infrastructures and accompanying services, and the development of a sustainable strategy for EMPHASIS in the form of a business plan. The business plan will consider aspects of the scientific potential, the usage concept, governance, sustainable financing, economic efficiency and social significance

Specific objectives of the Preparatory Phase project EMPHASIS-PREP leading towards EMPHASIS:

  • Developing and implementing a sustainable business plan for EMPHASIS 
  • Developing a European strategy for the establishment and maintenance of state-of-the-art research infrastructures, providing high-quality and demand-oriented access for users as well as opportunities for innovative technology development in the next decade including exploration of opportunities and business cases to establish new infrastructures
  • Maturing and extending the European plant phenotyping community of technology developers, infrastructure providers and users, and providing support and consulting in the establishment of national (or regional) platforms for countries (regions) that could potentially join EMPHASIS
  • Testing and designing integrated e-infrastructures that allow coordinated, secure and high-quality data management and handling, as well as data integration between EMPHASIS infrastructures; this will include technical preparatory work especially for the integration and e-infrastructure linking the installations
  • Implementing effective communication and networking activities (i) between all relevant stakeholders of the infrastructure (research organisations, funding agencies, ministries, users and technology developers) as well as public outreach
  • Establish EMPHASIS in the ESFRI project landscape