The Japan Analytical Instruments Manufacturers’ Association (JAIMA), in cooperation with the International Standardization Committee for Surface Chemical Analysis (JSCA), is undertaking efforts to establish MaiML as an ISO standard. As planned, an evaluation will be conducted under VAMAS/TWA2 Project A45(*), and based on the outcome, Japan intends to submit a New Work Item Proposal (NWIP) at the SC3 meeting during the ISO/TC201 General Assembly in 2026.
In Japan, a draft JIS standard for MaiML was developed by a drafting committee organized under JAIMA as the responsible body, and it was published as JIS K 0200:2024 on May 20, 2024. Building on this publication, Japan is currently preparing its proposal to establish MaiML as an ISO standard.
To support international evaluators, experts, and collaborators who have been invited to participate in VAMAS/TWA2 Project A45, we are providing the following documents as background information. These materials are intended to facilitate their understanding of JIS K 0200:2024, which forms the basis of the MaiML format standardization proposal.
The key features of MaiML (Measurement Analysis Instrument Markup Language) are that it is an XML (Extensible Markup Language)-compliant data format and that it can comprehensively handle the entire measurement and analysis process—from sample preparation to measurement and data processing—as provenance-tracked data. MaiML provides a standardized specification for a common data file format that is comprehensive and independent of any specific measurement method or analytical instrument.
For example, MaiML integrates metadata such as analytical instrument information, measurement conditions, and sample conditions together with measurement data such as images and spectra into a single dataset. This enables storage in a data lake, construction of databases in the required formats, and searching and reuse of MaiML data. The entire process is modeled using Petri nets, supporting the description of measurement and analysis procedures as well as verification of reproducibility. Tamper resistance is ensured through digital signatures and hashing. Furthermore, selective encryption makes it possible to conceal only confidential parts while sharing the publicly accessible portions. All processes are tracked as auditable logs, making MaiML an innovative data format that provides reproducibility, reliability, and security to meet needs such as "recording and digitizing measurement-analysis processes", "integrated multimodal data analysis", "AI-driven analysis", and "design of measurement-analysis workflows".
We have published guidelines in this documentary that describe the use cases for applying JIS K 0200, how to create data, case studies, and how to utilize the data as documents to help you make specific use of JIS K 0200.
We will provide you with a lot of information.
We provide support tools and procedures to ensure that the data format created by JIS K 0200 users is in line with JIS K 0200:2024.
Download and unzip this ZIP file to unzip 14 MaiML schema definition files (XSD files). As a reference for using these MaiML schema definition files, we have prepared a schema check procedure for MaiML files using LINQPad (a desktop app with a free version).
When performing a schema check for MaiML, you can read the MaiML schema definition file into an XML schema checker such as LINQPad and verify the validity of the target file. A reference example of actually performing a schema check is described in the procedure manual above.