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Research Data Management

This guide is designed to support research data management by providing guidance on good practices and pointing to additional resources.

How to Share Data

For researchers, there are a number of ways for sharing datasets beyond their own research teams.1 

  • Depositing data in a disciplinary repository
  • Depositing data in Knowledge@UChicago, the institutional repository
  • Publishing in a data journal
  • Submitting data with a journal article as a supplemental file or repository that the journal publisher requires/recommends
  • Using a personal or research group website, wiki, blog, or other web-based tool (note that these tools may be effective in the short term but should not be viewed as solutions for long-term sharing and preservation)

Knowledge@UChicago

Knowledge@UChicago is the University of Chicago's institutional repository, a place that faculty, students, and staff can use for sharing and preserving scholarly works, including datasets. It is a service supported by the Library and IT Services at the University of Chicago.

Making work available in Knowlege@UChicago has multiple benefits, including:

  • enhanced exposure and discoverability of your work
  • improved accessibility to a wider audience of readers, including those without journal subscriptions
  • assignment of a DOI (digital object identifier) to your work, a unique string that serves as a persistent link  
  • compliance with funder requirements for open access to your research 
  • preservation managed by the Library

Before depositing data in the institutional repository, review the Knowledge@UChicago policies and contact the Library with any questions. This figure captures the simple deposit process, but the Library is available to assist users as they add content to Knowledge@UChicago. 

Users can log-in to Knowledge@UChicago with their CNetID and create a profile. Users should then contact the Library at knowledge@lib.uchicago.edu to complete set-up of account. Once this is done, users will be able to describe their works and submit for review, which will take one business day.

In 2019, the University of Chicago will be moving to a new repository platform that will make it even more simple for users to deposit datasets. Stay tuned for updates.

Data Repositories

Research data repositories can host, provide persistent access to, and preserve datasets. For many disciplines, there are repositories familiar to and well-used by researchers in the field. In addition to considering disciplinary practices around data deposit, researchers should determine whether their funder or publisher requires or recommends a specific data repository for archiving and making data available. 

For researchers working to locate a repository for storing, accessing, and sharing data, re3data.org, a searchable registry of data repositories, is a very useful starting point. Researchers can browse re3data.org by discipline, data type, and country to discover an appropriate home for their data or to find shared datasets to use in their research. 

The University of Chicago Library has prepared a LibGuide on disciplinary data repositories for locating and sharing datasets.