Sustainability of Research Data Management

|1 www.helmholtz-metadata.de Sustainability of Research Data Management Dr Özlem ÖZKAN Sustainability in the Digital Transformation of Basic Research on Universe & Matter 30 May 2023 - 2 June 2023 Landhaus Nordhelle, Meinerzhagen What is sustainability? In 1987, the United Nations defined sustainability as “meeting the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs.” Cracks run through the partially dried-up river bed of the Gan River, a tributary to Poyang Lake during a regional drought in Nanchang, Jiangxi province, China. (REUTERS/Thomas Peter/File Photo) |3 Sustainable research data management refers to the practices and approaches employed to ensure •the long-term availability, •accessibility, •usability & •integrity of research data while minimizing negative environmental, social and economic impacts. Sustainable Research Data Management https://www.theatlantic.com/national/archive/2013/12/scientific-data-lostforever/356422/ Sustainable Research Data Management Good data management helps to prevent errors and increases the quality of the analyses, saves time and resources in the long run, so it minimizes negative environmental, social, and economic effects. In May 2018, the EU Commission published a report: not having FAIR research data costs the European economy at least €10.2bn/year https://www.embl.org/documents/wp-content/uploads/2021/10/EMBL-EBIimpact-report-summary-2021.pdf http://publications.europa.eu/resource/cellar/d375368c-1a0a11e9-8d04-01aa75ed71a1.0001.01/DOC_1 Data sustainability involves ensuring that data remains accessible, usable &valuable over time. FAIR data principles aim to maximize the usefulness and impact of research data by enabling it to be easily shared and reused by others. Data sustainability and FAIR data Open Science Training Handbook https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.1212496 FAIR DATA properly documented + easily searchable discoverability and accessibility (key components of data sustainability) FAIR DATA stored in open + interoperable formats: easily reusable = likely to remain relevant and valuable over time (usability) For example, Open Science Training Handbook https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.1212496 Open Science Training Handbook https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.1212496 Sustainability of data was a problem in the past as well ▪Blue Ribbon Task Force on Sustainable Digital Preservation and Access. (2010). Sustainable Economics for a Digital Planet: Ensuring Long-term Access to Digital Information. ▪Berman, F., & Cerf, V. (2013). Who will pay for public access to research data?. Science, 341(6146), 616-617. dsc.edu/biblio/BRTF_Final_Report.pdf ▪Beagrie, N., & Houghton, J. W. (2014). The Value and Impact of Data Sharing and Curation A synthesis of three recent studies of UK research data centres. ▪Dillo, I., Treloar, A., Lusoli, W., Kupiainen, I., Asch, M., Diepenbroek, M., ... & Harrower, N. (2017). Business models for sustainable research data repositories. OECD SCIENCE, TECHNOLOGY AND INNOVATION POLICY PAPERS. But the main challenge was economic: there wasn’t a balance between available storage and the volume of the data Now it is not an issue anymore We have enough storages but sustainability is still a problem Which digital information should we preserve? The cost of data preservation According to the UK Data Service Guide on Research data management and costs : the storage of an average project’s data costs 60 Euros/hour. According to the International Energy Agency: data centers globally accounted for about 1% of global electricity consumption in 2020 Sustainable Research Data Management Science Europe has been particularly focusing on sustainability of research data since ~2019. They published a guide for research funders, research organisations and research infrastructures in June 2021: „Practical Guide to Sustainable Research Data” DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.4769703 Helmholtz Zentrum Berlin (HZB) uses NeXus standard: −The center provides one staff to work in the advisory committee in the NeXus project. −This person communicates with HZB‘s scientists and identifies the needs of the researchers. −The committee examines all proposed amendments and extensions in the NeXus format. −They decide to extend the format accordingly. Example: Having active community engagement https://www.nexusformat.org/NIAC.html Having active community engagement So the scientists all over the world, who are working in the same area, are using and will probably be using the same format for their data. This means, They guarantee that data will be accessible by the next generations in the same field: Once researchers have found the data, they should be able to access it by using standardized mechanisms. The data becomes reusable: Keeping in line with these standards will lead new data to be reused easily and suitably. Thank you very much! 18