Posted by echernier  |  August 29, 2017

"Research data should be freely accessible to everyone – for scientists as well as for the general public."

The SNSF agrees with this principle and will introduce new requirements in its project funding scheme as of October 2017. Researchers will have to include a data management plan (DMP) in their funding application. At the same time, the SNSF expects that data generated by funded projects will be publicly accessible in digital databases provided there are no legal, ethical, copyright or other issues.

The SNSF therefore expects all its funded researchers

  • to store the research data they have worked on and produced during the course of their research work,
  • to share these data with other researchers, unless they are bound by legal, ethical, copyright, confidentiality or other clauses, and
  • to deposit their data and metadata onto existing public repositories in formats that anyone can find, access and reuse without restriction.

Research data is collected, observed or generated factual material that is commonly accepted in the scientific community as necessary to document and validate research findings.