Infrastructure and Facilities

1. Sustainable Digital Research Infrastructure

The Digital Humanities Institute (DHI) operates secure, scalable digital research infrastructure designed to support complex, multi-partner research projects. Our facilities integrate secure server infrastructure, embedded research software engineering, and standards-based data architectures to support sustainable and interoperable research platforms beyond the lifetime of funded projects.

We prioritise long-term sustainability, open standards, and reproducibility in all infrastructure design. Our systems are typically developed using modular, API-driven architectures with containerised deployment environments and standards-based metadata frameworks to ensure interoperability and long-term maintainability.

2. Research Software Engineering

DHI hosts a team of Research Software Engineers embedded within research projects, working directly with academic investigators from project design through delivery and long-term maintenance. This model ensures:

  • Custom platform and tool development tailored to project needs
  • Agile, version-controlled software development workflows (e.g. Git-based version control, structured code review, and documented release cycles)
  • Integration of research requirements into technical design
  • Ongoing maintenance and extensibility planning
  • Documentation and reproducibility support

Our RSE team has extensive experience delivering digital platforms, research databases, analytical workbenches, and interoperable systems for externally funded projects.

3. Secure Hosting and Data Management

DHI operates secure hosting environments that support:

  • Scalable web applications and research platforms
  • Structured and unstructured data storage
  • Controlled access systems where required
  • Secure development and testing environments
  • Regular backups and system monitoring, including automated backup schedules, secure server environments managed in collaboration with institutional IT services, and documented disaster recovery procedures

We implement best practices in data security and integrity, aligned with institutional and international standards.

4. Data Interoperability and Standards

Our infrastructure is designed to operate within distributed, transnational research ecosystems. We support:

  • FAIR data implementation
  • Metadata standards and schema design, including crosswalks between established standards (e.g. Dublin Core, TEI, CIDOC-CRM where appropriate)
  • Linked open data and semantic web technologies
  • API development for interoperability
  • Cross-institutional data harmonisation

This enables Horizon Europe project outputs to integrate effectively with broader European and international research infrastructures.

5. Long-Term Sustainability

A defining feature of DHI’s model is long-term stewardship of digital outputs. We design infrastructures that prioritise:

  • Sustainability planning from project inception
  • Modular and extensible architecture
  • Use of open-source technologies where appropriate
  • Clear documentation and maintainability
  • Continued hosting within institutional infrastructure environments, with documented maintenance and governance procedures.

DHI has delivered and continues to maintain dozens of publicly accessible research platforms and digital resources developed through externally funded projects. Some of our platforms have been online since the late 1990s.

6. Advanced Computational Resources

Our infrastructure supports advanced computational research, including:

  • Large-scale text and data processing
  • Natural language processing and machine learning workflows, including large-scale corpus processing pipelines and supervised and unsupervised modelling approaches.
  • Entity resolution and record linkage
  • Geospatial analysis and network modelling
  • AI-supported data extraction and structuring

These capabilities enable the analysis of complex cultural, historical, and societal datasets at scale.

7. Responsible and Ethical Infrastructure

We embed responsible research and innovation principles within infrastructure design, including:

  • GDPR-compliant data handling
  • Data minimisation and access control
  • Transparent AI integration
  • Reproducibility and open science practices
  • Consideration of environmental sustainability in digital workflows
8. Consortium Readiness

DHI’s infrastructure and facilities are designed to support Horizon Europe consortia requiring:

  • Technical work package leadership
  • Platform development and data integration
  • Sustainable digital research infrastructures
  • Capacity building and training environments
  • Long-term resource stewardship

We welcome discussions with project coordinators regarding infrastructure requirements at early proposal stages.