Ana Sofía Cardenal
Ana S. Cardenal is a Professor of Political Science at the Universitat Oberta de Catalunya (UOC), and is affiliated with the Barcelona Supercomputing Center (BSC). Her primary research interests lie at the intersection of political science, communication, and computational social science. At the BSC, she leads research that explores the complex dynamics between communication and social behaviour.
Laia Castro
Laia Castro (PhD, University of Fribourg) is an assistant professor at the department of Political Science, University of Barcelona, and leads the Digital Media and Politics team at the Barcelona Supercomputing Center. She specializes in political communication, comparative (social) media research & public opinion, with a particular focus on cross-cutting exposure and communication across political lines. Currently, she does empirical work on the deliberative and informative potential of social media by use of quantitative and computational methods.
Mercè Crossas
Dr. Mercè Crosas currently leads the Computational Social Sciences and Humanities program at the Barcelona Supercomputing Center, a new program to facilitate the use of data and supercomputing in social science and humanities, foster collaboration between social and computer scientists, and conduct cutting-edge research in these areas. Mercè is also President of CODATA.
From 2021 to 2022, Dr. Crosas was the Secretary of Open Government at the Generalitat de Catalunya, where she was responsible for open data, transparency, and civic participation. Prior to that, she spent most of her scientific career at Harvard University, as Chief Data Science and Technology Officer at the Institute for Quantitative Social Sciences and University Research Data Management Officer. She has also led data systems development in biotech companies and has conducted research and scientific engineering in astrophysics at the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics. Crosas holds a doctorate in Astrophysics from Rice University and a degree in Physics from the University of Barcelona.
Simon Hodson
Executive Director of CODATA since August 2013, Simon Hodson is an expert on data policy issues and research data management, and has contributed to influential reports such as the OECD-CODATA report on Business Models for Sustainable Data Repositories. He chaired the European Commission’s Expert Group on FAIR Data which produced the report Turning FAIR into Reality, and he was vice-chair of the UNESCO Open Science Advisory Committee, tasked with drafting the UNESCO Recommendation on Open Science. Simon is also a member of the Data Documentation Initiative (DDI) Scientific Board, and was the coordinator of the WorldFAIR Project.
Steven McEachern
Steve McEachern commenced as Director of the UK Data Service at the University of Essex in August 2024, following 15 years as Director of the Australian Data Archive (ADA), at the Australian National University (ANU). He is responsible for the strategic development and direction of the Service and leading the partnership of 5 organisations delivering the Service from 2024-2030. Steve is also the treasurer of CODATA; vice-chair of the DDI Alliance Executive Committee; and co-chair of the Research Data Alliance Social Science Interest Group.
Steve has high level of expertise in data archiving and survey data collection, and has been actively involved in the development and application of new methods, and technological advancements, in these areas over the past 25 years. This included leadership of the Social Surveys work package in the recently completed WorldFAIR project. He also has 25 years of experience in the teaching of research methods in the social sciences.
Elena Rovenskaya
Elena Rovenskaya is Advancing Systems Analysis (ASA) Program Director and Principal Research Scholar at the International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis (IIASA), Laxenburg, Austria. IIASA’s ASA Program brings together about 150 scientists from around the world and multiple disciplines who strive to advance the methodologies of systems analysis including novel data and novel modelling frameworks. Elena Rovenskaya’s background is in optimization and optimal control, with scientific interests focusing on mathematical modeling of complex socio-environmental systems and identifying common patterns across a range of such systems. Elena Rovenskaya is a member of CODATA’s Executive Committee since 2021.