Rethinking UX for Sustainable Science Gateways: Orientations from Practice

As science gateways continue to mature, sustainability has become a central concern for funders, developers, and institutional stakeholders. While user experience (UX) is increasingly recognized as important, it is often approached in a limited way—focused primarily on interface usability or addressed late in the development cycle. In this short paper, I argue that UX should be understood not as a discrete feature or evaluation stage, but as a broader perspective for reasoning about the sustainability of science gateways. This view draws on user-centered design practice and systems thinking, recognizing that infrastructure, staffing, community engagement, and development timelines all shape how gateways are experienced and sustained. Drawing on an interview study and consulting experience across more than 65 gateway projects, I describe common challenges in how UX is framed and practiced. I identify three recurring orientations toward UX—ad hoc, project-based, and strategic—that reflect different ways teams engage with users, interpret feedback, and incorporate design thinking into their workflows. These patterns are not a maturity model, but a lens for reflecting on how UX is positioned within gateway development. By reframing UX as a sustainability concern, I aim to support more intentional, design-oriented thinking about how science gateways are built, supported, and sustained.