Exploring the Role of Open Science Hardware in Europe’s Citizen Science Infrastructure
📢 From 19 to 21 January 2026, the HEROES (Hardware Ecosystem Requirements for Open and Emerging Science) Workshop gathered around 40 researchers, practitioners, institutional leaders, and funders to reflect on the role of Open Science Hardware (OScH) in shaping more open and participatory research practices❗
✳️ The invitation-only workshop took place across three locations in Geneva – CERN, the SDG Solution Space at the University of Geneva, and the International Telecommunication Union – and it was organised by the Open Science Hardware Foundation in collaboration with CERN and RIECS-Concept.
Exploring open science hardware as infrastructure
✳️ Discussions were structured around four thematic tracks: institutions, standards, economics, and ecosystems. Rather than focusing on individual tools, participants examined open science hardware as an infrastructure challenge.
✨ A shared view emerged that, while open hardware is technically mature and increasingly visible in policy and research, its wider adoption is limited by missing connective elements such as governance, coordination, stewardship, and institutional support ✨
Key challenges and opportunities
✳️ Across tracks, several recurring issues were identified:
⚫ Sustainability beyond funding: long-term success depends on maintenance capacity, governance models, and institutional recognition of stewardship work, rather than on initial investment alone.
⚫ Procurement as a critical bottleneck: existing procurement frameworks often disadvantage open hardware, despite its benefits for transparency, adaptability, and long-term resilience.
⚫ Standards for interoperability and trust: lightweight, open, and practice-driven standards were seen as essential to support reuse, interoperability, and institutional confidence, without constraining innovation.
⚫ Fragmented ecosystems: although vibrant communities and initiatives exist, limited visibility and coordination reduce collective impact and lead to duplication of effort.
Relevance for citizen science and RIECS-Concept
✳️ A recurring theme throughout the workshop was the close alignment between open science hardware and citizen science. Participants emphasised that participatory research achieves deeper scientific and educational impact when citizens engage not only with data, but also with the instruments used to produce it.
✳️ These discussions strongly resonate with the ambitions of RIECS-Concept. Integrating open science hardware as a core enabling layer of citizen science infrastructure offers a concrete way to reduce fragmentation, support sustainable governance practices, and strengthen the role of citizens as active partners in research.
✨ As RIECS-Concept continues to develop its vision for a European infrastructure for citizen science, the insights from HEROES highlight the strong complementarity between open hardware and participatory research – and the opportunity to embed openness not only in data and methods, but also in the instruments that make science possible ✨
Published 2026-02-25