An increasing number of funding bodies request or require that their funding recipients create and follow Data Management Plans (DMP) and implement specific research data management policies.
Generally at the proposal stage a short DMP is required covering:
What standards will be used
How data will be shared
How data will be curated and preserved
During the project, generally 3-6 months post award, a full DMP is required. However, this is not a fixed document and should evolve throughout the lifecycle of the project. In general, Irish funding bodies are increasingly aligning themselves with the Science Europe Core Requirements for Data Management Plans. To help researchers, Science Europe has created an easy to follow DMP Template, which addresses the majority of issues frequently raised by funders.
RCSI recognises research data as a valuable institutional asset, and the role of research data management in underpinning research excellence and integrity. The RCSI Research Data Management Policy applies to all College members engaged in research, including staff and research students, and those who are conducting research on behalf of the College. It applies to all research irrespective of funding. Researchers have the primary responsibility for ensuring research data will be managed in line with funder requirements as well as College policy and other relevant regulations and legislation.
The National Open Research Forum is a collaboration with representatives from research funding agencies, government departments, educational authorities, library sectors and other key stakeholders in the research system, aimed at delivering an Irish agenda on Open Access. The role of NORF is to propose national actions to address the challenges of changing the Irish research system to strengthen, promote or better support open research practices as outlined in the National Framework. NORF prepared Ireland’s National Framework on the Transition to an Open Research Environment, launched by the Government of Ireland in July 2019. The following sections are of relevance to Research Data Management:
Enabling FAIR Research Data
15. The following research data management principles are confirmed and supported:
i) Findable, Accessible, Interoperable, and Reusable (FAIR) data contribute to research integrity and reproducibility.
ii) Those involved in each stage of the research process should have the capacity and skills necessary to enable FAIR data.
iii) Prior planning is essential to ensure that research data are managed effectively through all stages of the research cycle, from creation to long-term preservation.
iv) Research data should be interoperable across disciplinary boundaries to enable unrestricted sharing of reusable data between different systems and domains.
v) A robust citation mechanism for referencing data is necessary for research validation and to make data findable and accessible.
16. Data management planning is required as a standard practice from the earliest stage in the research process. Data management plans, required as part of that standard practice, should address the following core requirements: data description and collection or reuse of existing data; documentation and data quality; storage and back-up during the research process; legal and ethical requirements; data sharing and long-term preservation; and data management responsibilities and resources.
17. Datasets should be made easily identifiable through persistent identifiers, accompanied by standardised metadata, including funder names and grant numbers.
i) Where appropriate, datasets should be linked to other datasets and publications through recognised mechanisms.
ii) Additional information should be provided to enable the proper evaluation and reuse of data.
iii) Interoperability standards should be applied to facilitate the reuse of data within and across disciplines and to support automated processes acting across large, heterogeneous datasets.
18. Research data should be ‘as open as possible, as closed as necessary’:
i) Research will become and remain findable, accessible, interoperable, and re-usable within a secure and trusted environment, through national and international digital infrastructures, including, where appropriate, within the European Open Science Cloud (EOSC).
ii) Research data may be restricted for justifiable reasons, such as commercial exploitation, confidentiality, security, protection of personal data, the achievement of the project’s aim, and incompatibility with the further exploitation of the research results, or other stated legitimate grounds. Shared metadata are especially important for restricted data and should be made accessible if possible.
iii) Taking into account technological developments (including dynamic [real-time] data), the licensing terms used should not unduly restrict text and data mining of research data resulting from publicly funded research, in accordance with and without prejudice to the applicable copyright legislation.
iv) Any data, know-how, and/or information, whatever its form or nature, which is held by private parties in a joint public/private partnership prior to the research action will not be affected by this policy.
19. Funders and institutions will include, in grant conditions and other support for research, their requirements for data management plans and for data sharing, together with details of their mechanisms for monitoring compliance.
Please see the full National Framework on the Transition to an Open Research Environment for further details. To contact NORF, please contact the National Open Research Coordinator, Dr Daniel Bangert.
For data gathered and generated in whole or in part from HRB-funded research, the following policy should be adhered to with effect from 1st of January 2020:
Please see the full HRB Policy on Management and Sharing of Research Data for further details.
As a recipient of an Irish Research Council funded award, you should adhere to the following data management policy:
This policy is intended to encourage the improvement of discoverability and development of open access to research data over time. Please see the Irish Research Council (IRC) Open Access Policy for further details. The Irish Research Council has also created a DMP Tips and Advice document to help COALESCE and Laureate awardees update their data management plans.
Wellcome Trust expects researchers to manage their research outputs in a way that will achieve the greatest health benefit. As a recipient of a Wellcome Trust funded award, you should adhere to the following data, software and materials management and sharing policy:
Plans should reflect established best practice in the respective research field. In particular, researchers should make sure their shared outputs:
Grantholders should review their outputs management plan throughout the research lifecycle.
Wellcome will also consider whether researchers have managed and shared their research outputs in line with our requirements, as a critical part of the end-of-grant reporting process.
This policy is intended to encourage the improvement of discoverability and development of open access to research data over time. Please see the Wellcome Trust data, software and materials management and sharing policy for further details. The Wellcome Trust has also created guidelines to help researchers complete the Outputs Management Plan and a range of other How To Guides related to FAIR data practices.
Appropriate data management and data sharing are fundamental to all stages of the research process and support high quality, reproducible research. As a recipient of a Science Foundation Ireland funded award, you should adhere to the following data management policy:
Please see the Science Foundation Ireland Open Access Policy and Research Data Management guide for further details.
Horizon 2020 supports the FAIR data principles and mandates open access to all research data from July 2017, with the possibility to opt out from this “Open Research Data” pilot.
Further Resources:
Unlike Horizon 2020, there is no option to opt out of “Open Research Data” with Horizon Europe grants. The beneficiaries of a Horizon Europe grant must manage the digital research data generated during the project responsibly in line with the FAIR principles, and deposit the data in a trusted open access repository. The following actions should all be taken as outlined in the Model Grant Agreement:
Please see the Horizon Europe Model Grant Agreement and DMP Template for further details. The European Commission has also created a Horizon Europe: Open Science infographic to highlight the open science requirements of all Horizon Europe grants.