diff --git a/dhp-schemas/pom.xml b/dhp-schemas/pom.xml
index 89e52858b..8338f69e4 100644
--- a/dhp-schemas/pom.xml
+++ b/dhp-schemas/pom.xml
@@ -30,7 +30,12 @@
             <groupId>com.fasterxml.jackson.core</groupId>
             <artifactId>jackson-databind</artifactId>
         </dependency>
-        
+
+        <dependency>
+            <groupId>com.google.guava</groupId>
+            <artifactId>guava</artifactId>
+        </dependency>
+
          <dependency>
             <groupId>junit</groupId>
             <artifactId>junit</artifactId>
diff --git a/dhp-schemas/src/main/java/eu/dnetlib/dhp/schema/action/AtomicAction.java b/dhp-schemas/src/main/java/eu/dnetlib/dhp/schema/action/AtomicAction.java
new file mode 100644
index 000000000..0f9aa3adb
--- /dev/null
+++ b/dhp-schemas/src/main/java/eu/dnetlib/dhp/schema/action/AtomicAction.java
@@ -0,0 +1,38 @@
+package eu.dnetlib.dhp.schema.action;
+
+import com.fasterxml.jackson.databind.annotation.JsonDeserialize;
+import eu.dnetlib.dhp.schema.oaf.Oaf;
+
+import java.io.Serializable;
+
+@JsonDeserialize(using = AtomicActionDeserializer.class)
+public class AtomicAction<T extends Oaf> implements Serializable {
+
+    private Class<T> clazz;
+
+    private T payload;
+
+    public AtomicAction() {
+    }
+
+    public AtomicAction(Class<T> clazz, T payload) {
+        this.clazz = clazz;
+        this.payload = payload;
+    }
+
+    public Class<T> getClazz() {
+        return clazz;
+    }
+
+    public void setClazz(Class<T> clazz) {
+        this.clazz = clazz;
+    }
+
+    public T getPayload() {
+        return payload;
+    }
+
+    public void setPayload(T payload) {
+        this.payload = payload;
+    }
+}
diff --git a/dhp-schemas/src/main/java/eu/dnetlib/dhp/schema/action/AtomicActionDeserializer.java b/dhp-schemas/src/main/java/eu/dnetlib/dhp/schema/action/AtomicActionDeserializer.java
new file mode 100644
index 000000000..e6017288f
--- /dev/null
+++ b/dhp-schemas/src/main/java/eu/dnetlib/dhp/schema/action/AtomicActionDeserializer.java
@@ -0,0 +1,29 @@
+package eu.dnetlib.dhp.schema.action;
+
+import com.fasterxml.jackson.core.JsonParser;
+import com.fasterxml.jackson.core.JsonProcessingException;
+import com.fasterxml.jackson.databind.DeserializationContext;
+import com.fasterxml.jackson.databind.JsonDeserializer;
+import com.fasterxml.jackson.databind.JsonNode;
+import com.fasterxml.jackson.databind.ObjectMapper;
+import eu.dnetlib.dhp.schema.oaf.Oaf;
+
+import java.io.IOException;
+
+public class AtomicActionDeserializer extends JsonDeserializer {
+
+    @Override
+    public Object deserialize(JsonParser jp, DeserializationContext ctxt) throws IOException, JsonProcessingException {
+        JsonNode node = jp.getCodec().readTree(jp);
+        String classTag = node.get("clazz").asText();
+        JsonNode payload = node.get("payload");
+        ObjectMapper mapper = new ObjectMapper();
+
+        try {
+            final Class<?> clazz = Class.forName(classTag);
+            return new AtomicAction(clazz, (Oaf) mapper.readValue(payload.toString(), clazz));
+        } catch (ClassNotFoundException e) {
+            throw new IOException(e);
+        }
+    }
+}
diff --git a/dhp-schemas/src/main/java/eu/dnetlib/dhp/schema/oaf/Relation.java b/dhp-schemas/src/main/java/eu/dnetlib/dhp/schema/oaf/Relation.java
index 24a363bec..6738b8693 100644
--- a/dhp-schemas/src/main/java/eu/dnetlib/dhp/schema/oaf/Relation.java
+++ b/dhp-schemas/src/main/java/eu/dnetlib/dhp/schema/oaf/Relation.java
@@ -2,10 +2,11 @@ package eu.dnetlib.dhp.schema.oaf;
 
 import java.util.ArrayList;
 import java.util.List;
+import java.util.Objects;
 import java.util.stream.Collectors;
 import java.util.stream.Stream;
 
-import org.junit.Assert;
+import static com.google.common.base.Preconditions.checkArgument;
 
 public class Relation extends Oaf {
 
@@ -70,14 +71,34 @@ public class Relation extends Oaf {
 	}
 
 	public void mergeFrom(final Relation r) {
-		Assert.assertEquals("source ids must be equal", getSource(), r.getSource());
-		Assert.assertEquals("target ids must be equal", getTarget(), r.getTarget());
-		Assert.assertEquals("relType(s) must be equal", getRelType(), r.getRelType());
-		Assert.assertEquals("subRelType(s) must be equal", getSubRelType(), r.getSubRelType());
-		Assert.assertEquals("relClass(es) must be equal", getRelClass(), r.getRelClass());
+
+		checkArgument(Objects.equals(getSource(), r.getSource()),"source ids must be equal");
+		checkArgument(Objects.equals(getTarget(), r.getTarget()),"target ids must be equal");
+		checkArgument(Objects.equals(getRelType(), r.getRelType()),"relType(s) must be equal");
+		checkArgument(Objects.equals(getSubRelType(), r.getSubRelType()),"subRelType(s) must be equal");
+		checkArgument(Objects.equals(getRelClass(), r.getRelClass()),"relClass(es) must be equal");
+
 		setCollectedFrom(Stream.concat(getCollectedFrom().stream(), r.getCollectedFrom().stream())
 				.distinct() // relies on KeyValue.equals
 				.collect(Collectors.toList()));
 	}
 
+	@Override
+	public boolean equals(Object o) {
+		if (this == o) return true;
+		if (o == null || getClass() != o.getClass()) return false;
+		Relation relation = (Relation) o;
+		return relType.equals(relation.relType) &&
+				subRelType.equals(relation.subRelType) &&
+				relClass.equals(relation.relClass) &&
+				source.equals(relation.source) &&
+				target.equals(relation.target) &&
+				Objects.equals(collectedFrom, relation.collectedFrom);
+	}
+
+	@Override
+	public int hashCode() {
+		return Objects.hash(relType, subRelType, relClass, source, target, collectedFrom);
+	}
+
 }
diff --git a/dhp-schemas/src/test/java/eu/dnetlib/dhp/schema/action/AtomicActionTest.java b/dhp-schemas/src/test/java/eu/dnetlib/dhp/schema/action/AtomicActionTest.java
new file mode 100644
index 000000000..dcf20e342
--- /dev/null
+++ b/dhp-schemas/src/test/java/eu/dnetlib/dhp/schema/action/AtomicActionTest.java
@@ -0,0 +1,37 @@
+package eu.dnetlib.dhp.schema.action;
+
+import com.fasterxml.jackson.databind.ObjectMapper;
+import eu.dnetlib.dhp.schema.oaf.Relation;
+import org.apache.commons.lang3.StringUtils;
+import org.junit.Assert;
+import org.junit.Test;
+
+import java.io.IOException;
+
+public class AtomicActionTest {
+
+    @Test
+    public void serializationTest() throws IOException {
+
+        Relation rel = new Relation();
+        rel.setSource("1");
+        rel.setTarget("2");
+        rel.setRelType("resultResult");
+        rel.setSubRelType("dedup");
+        rel.setRelClass("merges");
+
+        AtomicAction aa1 = new AtomicAction(Relation.class, rel);
+
+        final ObjectMapper mapper = new ObjectMapper();
+        String json = mapper.writeValueAsString(aa1);
+
+        Assert.assertTrue(StringUtils.isNotBlank(json));
+
+        AtomicAction aa2 = mapper.readValue(json, AtomicAction.class);
+
+        Assert.assertEquals(aa1.getClazz(), aa2.getClazz());
+        Assert.assertEquals(aa1.getPayload(), aa2.getPayload());
+
+    }
+
+}
diff --git a/pom.xml b/pom.xml
index 0310a3f44..85a545eb0 100644
--- a/pom.xml
+++ b/pom.xml
@@ -148,6 +148,13 @@
 				<version>${dhp.commons.lang.version}</version>
 			</dependency>
 
+			<dependency>
+				<groupId>com.google.guava</groupId>
+				<artifactId>guava</artifactId>
+				<version>${dhp.guava.version}</version>
+			</dependency>
+
+
 			<dependency>
 				<groupId>commons-codec</groupId>
 				<artifactId>commons-codec</artifactId>
@@ -496,6 +503,7 @@
 		<dhp.spark.version>2.4.0.cloudera2</dhp.spark.version>
 		<dhp.jackson.version>2.9.6</dhp.jackson.version>
 		<dhp.commons.lang.version>3.5</dhp.commons.lang.version>
+		<dhp.guava.version>28.2-jre</dhp.guava.version>
 		<scala.version>2.11.12</scala.version>
 		<junit.version>4.12</junit.version>
 		<mongodb.driver.version>3.4.2</mongodb.driver.version>