b'FROM DATA LOSS TO RESEARCH LONGEVITYHow the University of Freiburg Preserved Scientific Value Across Thousands of Time SeriesAre You Losing Years of Research EveryThe Turning Point: Structuring Discovery, Time a Project Ends? One Location at a TimeIn academia, data often dies before its impact is realized. GraduateWeiler first encountered Aquarius while working at the University students leave, projects wrap, and hard-won datasets vanish intoof British Columbia. What stood out wasnt just the analytics. It was personal drives, external storage, or obscure codebases. For leadingthe platforms foundational approach: structuring data from the institutions tackling climate, hydrology, and ecological systems, thislocation up, not the sensor down.isnt just a tech problem. Its a threat to scientific integrity.At the University of Freiburg, one of Germanys most prestigious research hubs, this fragmentation risked sidelining decades ofAquarius starts with the location becausehydrological insight. In Professor Markus Weilers department,you need more than a measurement, advanced modeling and environmental monitoring had outgrown the systems built to support them. coordinates, and timestamp to know the quality of the data.Like most universities, we have a lot of data scientists who like to build their own systems. But weve learned that to get the most value out ofMARKUS WEILER, PROFESSORdata, you need structure, and in our case, hydrological expertise.The Challenge: Brilliant Research, Buried When the department secured a grant to install 10,000 sensors in by Disorganized Data Luxembourg, the decision was clear. Aquarius would be the data As the departments studies expanded from drone-assisted forestbackbone, handling everything from soil water content and isotopes research to soil isotope trackingso did the data burden. Filesto meteorological feeds and continuous NMR readings.spanned inconsistent formats, storage locations, and custom-built tools, many of which aged out as project leads moved on. The team even collaborated with Aquatic Informatics developers to expand supported parameters, adapting the platform to cutting-Critical context was being lost. And with it, the ability to link long-termedge academic needs.datasets, replicate results, or build on past research.'