Research Data Management:

A DIY Guide – What? Why? How?

CM Hub Research Data Management Tutorial

Imperial College London, 23rd June 2016

Ash Barnes and Sarah A. Stewart

Research Data Management Team

Central Library

Imperial College London

rdm-enquiries@imperial.ac.uk

LibraryServices

Research Data Management:

A DIY Guide – What? Why?

How?

Presented by:

Ash Barnes – Research Data Support Manager

Sarah Stewart – Research Data Support Assistant

rdm-enquiries@imperial.ac.uk

What is Research Data Management?

• ‘Research Data Management is the planning, organisation and preservation

of the evidence that underpins all research conclusions. Good data

management ensures data is safely stored, findable and can be used to

reproduce findings.’

• - Imperial College London Research Data Management Guide.

What are Data?

Data are…

“Facts and statistics collected together for reference or analysis”

(Oxford Dictionary of English 3rd ed)

“Information, especially facts or numbers, collected to be

examined and considered and used to help decision-

making…”

(Cambridge Advanced Learners Dictionary & Thesaurus)

"Research data is defined as recorded factual material commonly retained by

and accepted in the scientific community as necessary to

validate research findings; although the majority of such data is created in

digital format, all research data is included irrespective of the format in which

it is created."

Data are…

- Quantitative or Qualitative measurements, automated or observed

- Biological or medical specimens

- Images (photographs, drawings, etc.)

- Field and lab notes (observations)

- GIS measurements

- Simulations

- Software/code

- Videos

- Interviews

- Government records

- Different file formats

- Etc. What do you think data are? What types of data do you use/generate?

The Data Lifecycle

Why is Research Data Management Important?

Good Professional Practice:

- Funder mandates and requirements

- Supports institutional integrity (Imperial College policy)

- Supports collaboration through data sharing and re-use

- Reduces redundancy in research

Value to you as a Researcher:

- Reduce the risk of data loss

- Increased efficiency

- Validated and replicable research

- Increased sharing and re-use (increased possibilities for

collaboration)

- Increased citations

- Increased Impact!

The importance of RDM…

“In their parents' attic, in boxes in the garage, or stored on now-defunct

floppy disks — these are just some of the inaccessible places in which

scientists have admitted to keeping their old research data.”

http://www.nature.com/news/scientists-losing-data-at-a-rapid-rate-

1.14416

Protect your Data

A Near Miss!

Funder requirements…

“Publicly funded research data are a public good,

produced in the public interest, which should be made

openly available with as few restrictions as

possible…”

RCUK Common Principles on Data Policy

Funder requirements

Research Data Management Is Good Practice

How to Manage your Research Data at Imperial

Data Management Plans

- Funder requirement/mandate (eg. EPSRC, Wellcome, NIH)

- Fundamentals of data-handling during the course of the project.

- Supports data use and re-use beyond the life of the project.

- Plan for data security and sharing.

- Long-term data storage following the end of the project.

Data Management Plans: DMPOnline

Working with ‘Live’ Data: Box

- Unlimited data

storage

- Easy sharing and

collaboration

- Automated backup

- Machine-learning:

metadata

- Integration with MS

Office

- Further

developments…

Archiving your Data: Zenodo

Publishing your Data: The Data Access Statement

Publishing your Data: Making it Discoverable on Symplectic

Looking for Data? Repositories!

- Re3data

- DataCite

- Zenodo

- Dryad

- Figshare

- Spiral – Institutional Repository for Imperial College London

- Arxiv, Bioarxiv, etc. – Subject-specific data repositories

Any Questions ?

Thank you! For more Information:

Webpage: www.imperial.ac.uk/research-data-management

E-mail : rdm-enquiries@imperial.ac.uk

RDM Team – Ash Barnes, Sarah Stewart