Research Data Management

Why is data management important? 

In recent years, the data collected, generated, or used in the development of research projects have received increasing attention from the research community and research management bodies. At European level, the Horizon 2020 framework program and its Open Research Data Pilot have promoted the Research Data Management (RDM). This concept is an umbrella that encompasses different activities related to the creation, organization, structuring, storage, preservation and sharing of data. That is why projects that receive fundings from the European Commission require the development of a Data Management Plan (DMP), and the deposit of data following the FAIR principles (Findability, Accessibility, Interoperability, and Reuse) to increase the efficiency and transparency of research through the rapid dissemination of results and facilitate their reuse.   

Since 2016, all Catalan universities have research data management support services to help researchers make research Data Management Plans (DMP), put data on FAIR mode and publish them into the appropriate repository.

This service is coordinated by the Research Support Working Group, made up of representatives of the Catalan universities (UB, UAB, UPC, UPF, UdG, UdL, URV, UOC, UVic-UCC, URL), from the Balearic Islands and the Jaume I university. 

The activity of this working group has been organized in three main areas: 

• data management plans
• data repositories
• open data access policy

What are we doing at CSUC to publish research data in FAIR mode?

At CSUC we provide the tools to make research data management an easy and agile process for users. To do this, we make resources available to interested entities so that the publication of research data becomes open and following the FAIR principles. That is why we work hand in hand with universities and research centers to promote these principles and implement them in the day-to-day research in Catalonia. 

Research Data Repository

Research Data Repository (RDR) is a federated and multidisciplinary data repository whose objective is to increase the research efficiency and transparency through the rapid dissemination of datasets, and to facilitate their reuse.

Research Data Repository allows Catalan universities, CERCA research centers and other entities that carry out research to publish research datasets in FAIR mode and following the EOSC guidelines. CSUC is an observer member of the EOSC.   

The bases of this repository were established in the 2019 report on the requirements for a FAIR data research repository (FAIR x FAIR. Requeriments factibles, assolibles i implementables per a un repositori de dades de recerca FAIR). After a restricted access period, the repository went public in March 2021.  

Data management plan with eiNa DMP

To help researchers conduct better research, it is necessary to have data management plans, a concept that encompasses tasks such as the collection of the data used, its organization, documentation, storage, and preservation. It is therefore a matter of preparing documents that describe the lifecycle of the research data that has been collected and generated during a project. 

With eiNa DMP, research data management becomes a more agile process!

Open access policies to research data

We promote open access to research data through a joint position between different universities, based on the document "Proposal to establish a policy of open access to research data in Catalan universities". 

"Example of Data Management Policy for a university" represents a document of reference to facilitate its application at institutional level, as some universities already did (Universitat de Barcelona, Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona, Universitat de Girona, Universitat Rovira i Virgili and Universitat Oberta de Catalunya).