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About

About

Holds a Master degree in Information Science, by the University of Porto. Currently a Digital Media PhD student.

The main focus of interest is in the definition of domain-specific metadata modelos so researchers can describe the data they are creating.

Interest
Topics
Details

Details

  • Name

    João Aguiar Castro
  • Role

    Assistant Researcher
  • Since

    15th July 2013
  • Nationality

    Portugal
  • Service

    Management Support
  • Contacts

    +351222094199
    joao.a.castro@inesctec.pt
Publications

2023

Getting in touch with metadata: a DDI subset for FAIR metadata production in clinical psychology

Authors
Castro, JA; Rodrigues, J; Mena Matos, P; M D Sales, C; Ribeiro, C;

Publication
IASSIST Quarterly

Abstract
To address metadata with researchers it is important to use models that include familiar domain concepts. In the Social Sciences, the DDI is a well-accepted source of such domain concepts. To create FAIR data and metadata, we need to establish a compact set of DDI elements that fit the requirements in projects and are likely to be adopted by researchers inexperienced with metadata creation. Over time, we have engaged in interviews and data description sessions with research groups in the Social Sciences, identifying a manageable DDI subset. A recent Clinical Psychology project, TOGETHER, dealing with risk assessment for hereditary cancer, considered the inclusion of a DDI subset for the production of metadata that are timely and interoperable with data publication initiatives in the same domain. Taking a DDI subset identified by the data curators, we make a preliminary assessment of its use as a realistic effort on the part of researchers, taking into consideration the metadata created in two data description sessions, the effort involved, and overall metadata quality. A follow-up questionnaire was used to assess the perspectives of researchers regarding data description.

2022

Fostering the Adoption of DMP in Small Research Projects through a Collaborative Approach

Authors
Maciel, A; Castro, JA; Ribeiro, C; Almada, M; Midão, L;

Publication
Int. J. Digit. Curation

Abstract
In order to promote sound management of research data the European Commission, under the Horizon 2020 framework program, is promoting the adoption of a Data Management Plan (DMP) in research projects. Despite the value of a DMP to make data findable, accessible, interoperable and reusable (FAIR) through time, the development and implementation of DMPs is not yet a common practice in health research. Raising the awareness of researchers in small projects to the benefits of early adoption of a DMP is, therefore, a motivator for others to follow suit. In this paper we describe an approach to engage researchers in the writing of a DMP, in an ongoing project, FrailSurvey, in which researchers are collecting data through a mobile application for self-assessment of fragility. The case study is supported by interviews, a metadata creation session, as well as the validation of recommendations by researchers. With the outline of our process we also outline tools and services that supported the development of the DMP in this small project, particularly since there were no institutional services available to researchers

2021

Novelty Detection in Physical Activity

Authors
Leite, B; Abdalrahman, A; Castro, J; Frade, J; Moreira, J; Soares, C;

Publication
ICAART: PROCEEDINGS OF THE 13TH INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE ON AGENTS AND ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE - VOL 2

Abstract
Artificial Intelligence (AI) is continuously improving several aspects of our daily lives. There has been a great use of gadgets & monitoring devices for health and physical activity monitoring. Thus, by analyzing large amounts of data and applying Machine Learning (ML) techniques, we have been able to infer fruitful conclusions in various contexts. Activity Recognition is one of them, in which it is possible to recognize and monitor our daily actions. The main focus of the traditional systems is only to detect pre-established activities according to the previously configured parameters, and not to detect novel ones. However, when applying activity recognizers in real-world applications, it is necessary to detect new activities that were not considered during the training of the model. We propose a method for Novelty Detection in the context of physical activity. Our solution is based on the establishment of a threshold confidence value, which determines whether an activity is novel or not. We built and train our models by experimenting with three different algorithms and four threshold values. The best results were obtained by using the Random Forest algorithm with a threshold value of 0.8, resulting in 90.9% of accuracy and 85.1% for precision.

2020

Role of Content Analysis in Improving the Curation of Experimental Data

Authors
Aguiar Castro, JD; Landeira, C; da Silva, JR; Ribeiro, C;

Publication
Int. J. Digit. Curation

Abstract
As researchers are increasingly seeking tools and specialized support to perform research data management activities, the collaboration with data curators can be fruitful. Yet, establishing a timely collaboration between researchers and data curators, grounded in sound communication, is often demanding. In this paper we propose manual content analysis as an approach to streamline the data curator workflow. With content analysis curators can obtain domain-specific concepts used to describe experimental configurations in scientific publications, to make it easier for researchers to understand the notion of metadata and for the development of metadata tools. We present three case studies from experimental domains, one related to sustainable chemistry, one to photovoltaic generation and another to nanoparticle synthesis. The curator started by performing content analysis in research publications, proceeded to create a metadata template based on the extracted concepts, and then interacted with researchers. The approach was validated by the researchers with a high rate of accepted concepts, 84 per cent. Researchers also provide feedback on how to improve some proposed descriptors. Content analysis has the potential to be a practical, proactive task, which can be extended to multiple experimental domains and bridge the communication gap between curators and researchers. [This paper is a conference pre-print presented at IDCC 2020 after lightweight peer review.]

2019

Data Deposit in a CKAN Repository: A Dublin Core-Based Simplified Workflow

Authors
Karimova, Y; Castro, JA; Ribeiro, C;

Publication
Digital Libraries: Supporting Open Science - 15th Italian Research Conference on Digital Libraries, IRCDL 2019, Pisa, Italy, January 31 - February 1, 2019, Proceedings

Abstract
Researchers are currently encouraged by their institutions and the funding agencies to deposit data resulting from projects. Activities related to research data management, namely organization, description, and deposit, are not obvious for researchers due to the lack of knowledge on metadata and the limited data publication experience. Institutions are looking for solutions to help researchers organize their data and make them ready for publication. We consider here the deposit process for a CKAN-powered data repository managed as part of the IT services of a large research institute. A simplified data deposit process is illustrated here by means of a set of examples where researchers describe their data and complete the publication in the repository. The process is organised around a Dublin Core-based dataset deposit form, filled by the researchers as preparation for data deposit. The contacts with researchers provided the opportunity to gather feedback about the Dublin Core metadata and the overall experience. Reflections on the ongoing process highlight a few difficulties in data description, but also show that researchers are motivated to get involved in data publication activities.

Supervised
thesis

2020

Plano de gestão de dados para a produção de dados FAIR: O caso de uso FRAILSURVEY

Author
André Filipe da Costa Maciel

Institution
UP-FEUP

2020

Aplicação das recomendações da Research Data Alliance em grupos de investigação portugueses

Author
Jéssica Alexandra Lopes Barbosa

Institution
UP-FEUP

Vocabulários controlados na descrição de dados de investigação no Dendro

Author
Yulia Karimova

Institution
FCT