The SSH RIs sector is a particularly versatile area: social, linguistic, and cultural data serve large demands across all science domains. Some SSH infrastructures have already demonstrated high levels of interdisciplinarity. As an example, SHARE’s future development will be driven by interdisciplinary studies on the interaction of health and socio-economic living conditions. Over the life course of European citizens, health and socio-economic policies determine individuals’ standards and demand for their social and health care. Similarly, E-RIHS will enable the provision of state-of-the-art tools and services to cross-disciplinary users and communities. Among these are STEM and SSH researchers, curators and cultural heritage professionals, PhD students and technical staff: this variety encourages applications from user teams with a strong interdisciplinary character. So far, 90 successful user group leaders belonging to main academic backgrounds in the disciplines of Chemistry (20%), Humanities (50%) and Conservation Science (25%), have already been involved in working with E-RIHS data; the remaining figure includes users with a background in Engineering Physics, Earth and Life Sciences.

Metadata schemes and classification criteria either have been already advanced (as is the case for CLARIN ERIC), or they are gradually being established. The best practices developed can be shared with other domains. Besides metadata and standards, CESSDA ERIC, as an example, also promotes the need for data to be more interoperable within and beyond disciplines. Developments in the data space shall focus on the easier (machine-readable) processing of data from different disciplines to tackle societal challenges. A special focus is given to restricted and sensitive data.

SSH can also make important contributions to Destination Earth, the new digital twin of the Earth, which will help tackle climate change and protect nature. Destination Earth (EC) 
https://digital-strategy.ec.europa.eu/en/policies/destination-earth 

RIs have already achieved great results. Now the challenge is to ensure they become front-line resources in research to contribute to the major research challenges prioritised in a programme like Horizon Europe. Recently, ESS ERIC has been collaborating with ICOS ERIC on a H2020 project to improve carbon emission monitoring at the city level and collect data from residents in those cities in the same period, with the aim to create a more complete picture and help address the Green Deal. ESS has also been linking its data to data coming from the Environment domain in the context of the EOSC Future project, again underlining the power of cross-domain collaboration to address the Missions and other key areas. Collaboration between the various Science Clusters including SSHOC will become increasingly important, but this should not imply duplication of work, including metadata and tools.

Advanced studies to join information about health and socio-economic conditions are well developed. Understanding the impacts of environmental changes on communities and new industrial and biological threats are all part of what future science scholars will explore and where big data approaches will be dominant. A demand for more priority focused data sets, understood through the lens of Sustainable Development Goals or science advancements in specific fields, could pave the way to faster breakthroughs.

Moreover, more comparative data focused on special groups (e.g., societal elites or vulnerable groups) along with a number of challenges coming out of them would be welcomed and useful for understanding how European societies and democracy evolve as well as for future developments.