Submitted to the faculty of the University Graduate School in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree Master of Science in the School of Informatics, Indiana University June 2005 / The large volume of data generated by commercial and research laboratories, along with requirements mandated by regulatory agencies, have forced companies to use laboratory information management systems (LIMS) to improve efficiencies in tracking, managing samples, and precisely reporting test results. However, most general purpose LIMS do not provide an interface to automatically collect data from analytical instruments to store in a database. A scientific data management system (SDMS) provides a “Print-to-Database” technology, which facilitates the entry of reports generated by instruments directly into the SDMS database as Windows enhanced metafiles thus to minimize data entry errors. Unfortunately, SDMS does not allow performing further analysis. Many LIMS vendors provide plug-ins for single instrument but none of them provides a general purpose interface to extract the data from SDMS and store in LIMS. In this project, a general purpose middle layer named LabTechie is designed, built and tested for seamless integration between instruments, SDMS and LIMS. This project was conducted at American Institute of Technology (AIT) Laboratories, an analytical laboratory that specializes in trace chemical measurement of biological fluids. Data is generated from 20 analytical instruments, including gas chromatography/mass spectrometer (GC/MS), high performance liquid chromatography (HPLC), and liquid chromatography/mass spectrometer (LC/MS), and currently stored in NuGenesis SDMS iv (Waters, Milford, MA). This approach can be easily expanded to include additional instruments.

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Submitted to the faculty of the School of Informatics in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree Master of Science in Chemical Informatics (Laboratory Informatics Specialization), Indiana University, June 2006 / Industry and academic laboratories have long resisted conversion to electronic laboratory notebooks (ELN) while at the same time integrating many other kinds of information systems, most notably laboratory information management systems (LIMS), chromatography data systems (CDS), and scientific data management systems (SDMS), within laboratory operations. Scientists in both academia and industry stand to gain important functionality unavailable with paper notebooks with the adoption of ELNs such as comprehensive searching of notebooks (keyword, result, and molecular structure/substructure searching, for example); distributed availability; and long term access to data. Currently, most laboratory information systems operate independently, requiring manual data entry by users into each individual system. This process creates data and information disparities as well as creating poor referential integrity within experimental metadata. Electronic laboratory notebooks would provide a logical point around which experiment details and observations could be centered electronically. Through an ELN, experimental documentation or metadata could be communicated automatically with a LIMS, SDMS, or CDS without analyst involvement. This “electronically connected” system would allow analysts to perform their responsibilities without the interruption of independent information systems thus increasing analyst productivity and reducing user entry errors into data management systems. The thesis project consisted of two phases: the first phase was the implementation of an ELN and the second phase was the development of a software developer kit (SDK) for LABTrack based on Web Services. In the first phase of the project the adoption of an ELN, was studied within a classroom laboratory (G823 Introduction to Cell Biology) over the course of one academic semester. In the second phase of the project an SDK for LABTrack was developed to allow the importation of information from custom developed applications into LABTrack. Finally, a web portal integrating LABTrack and NuGenesis was developed to demonstrate the capabilities of the LABTrack SDK and existing capabilities of the NuGenesis SDK.

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The radio astronomy and space geodesy scientific instrumentation of the Hartebeesthoek Radio Astronomy Observatory (HartRAO) in Gauteng, South Africa, generate large volumes of data. Additional large data volumes will be generated by new geodesy instruments that are currently under construction and implementation, including a lunar laser ranging (LLR) system, seismic and meteorological systems and a Very Long Baseline Interferometry (VLBI) global observing system (VGOS) radio telescope. The existing HartRAO data management and storage system is outdated, incompatible and has limited storage capacity. This necessitates the design of a new geodetic research data management system (GRDMS). The focus of this dissertation is on providing a contextual framework for the design of the new system, including criteria, characteristics, components, an infrastructure architectural model and data structuring and organisation. An exploratory research methodology and qualitative research techniques were applied. Results attained from interviews conducted and literature consulted indicates a gap in the literature regarding the design of a data management system, specifically for geodetic data generated by HartRAO instrumentation. This necessitates the development of a conceptual framework for the design of a new GRDMS. Results are in alignment with the achievement of the research questions and objectives set for this study. / Information Science / M.A. (Information Science)