ESA - Science Resources

Data Sharing and Archiving

Ready access to data is a key concern in both basic research and problem-solving in the biological sciences, as the scale and scope of the questions that researchers ask expand, and as global problems demand data collected from around the world. With a grant from the National Science Foundation, the Ecological Society of America is facilitating a series of workshops on data sharing. These workshops are intended to help the ecology, evolution, and organismal biology communities find common ground on how to make data more readily discoverable and accessible in their own disciplines.

Society Summit, September 2004

This collaborative examination of data sharing began in September, 2004, when ESA hosted an NSF-sponsored three-day workshop of participants invited from the leadership of 12 major professional societies (including ESA ) that publish ecology, evolution, and organismal biology journals.

The goals of the “society summit meeting” were to (1) develop a common policy statement on data sharing and archiving and (2) identify technological, intellectual property, economics, and training issues for discussion in potential future workshops. The 35 participants arrived at a shared vision, common goals, and an agreement on specific near term strategies. [ESA bulletin article]

Based on discussions and conclusions reached at the Society Summit, three follow-on workshops were planned to further answer questions about data registries, data centers, and cultural obstacles to data sharing. We anticipate that these workshops, with attendees representing a broad cross-section of the ecology, organismal biology, and evolutionary biology communities, will be an effective way to continue the effort begun at the Society Summit and to begin addressing the associated technological and institutional arrangements for ensuring the accessibility and reliability of data archives.

Follow the links below to learn more about the data sharing project.

Meeting Announcement: Biodiversity Informatics, London, 1-3 June 2009

The e-Biosphere 09 International Conference on Biodiversity Informatics (see www.e-biosphere09.org) will take place in London on 1-5 June 2009. The Conference organizers take a broad view of "biodiversity informatics" and as a result, the Conference will be devoted to promoting interoperability of diverse data types, including those of interest to ecologists. The conference agenda is designed to:

Highlight the accomplishments and capabilities of Biodiversity Informatics;
Share information and demonstrations of databases and software; and
Gather input from researchers and users on the directions that Biodiversity Informatics should take in the next 5-10 years.

Input from the Conference will go directly into a two-day planning meeting of major Biodiversity Informatics initiatives. This input will inform their R&D roadmap and help them develop priorities for implementation and funding.

To enable the communities of researchers and users in Biodiversity Informatics to prepare properly for the Conference, the organizers announce the creation of an Online Conference Community (OCC). The OCC will be a web-based environment in which research and user communities can interact, develop position papers, and prepare for the London conference. In particular, OCC participants are being challenged to:

Demonstrate the cutting-edge capabilities for information workflow in each sub-community. How does information currently flow in the ecological sciences, and how fast does it flow? Each sub-community will have an opportunity to give a real-time demonstration during the three-day Conference, starting with field observations and ending in publications, online databases and websites, and aggregators of information.
Develop a vision for an ideal information workflow of the future for each sub-community. What data access and interoperability will ecologists need and want 5-10 years from now?

The OCC will begin with the following pre-constructed communities (several of which will be relevant to ESA members), but OCC participants will be able to merge and split communities and to form new communities. The initial sub-communities are:

Data Registries Workshop, July 2006

In July 2006, ESA hosted the first of three follow-on workshops, on data registries, in Washington, DC. Many of the same societies represented at the Society Summit attended the Data Registries Workshop, helping to maintain continuity of the discussions and fostering collaborative thinking.

Goals of the Data Registries Workshop included:

(1) Identify a set of common needs for, and desirable features of, data registries for ecology, evolutionary biology, and organismal biology, based on an understanding of existing resources;
(2) develop recommendations, as appropriate, for shared or independent data registries for the disciplines and societies represented; and
(3) develop preliminary plans for implementing those recommendations.

Click here to read the Registries Workshop Report.

Data Centers Workshop

The second workshop, "Data Centers for Ecology, Evolution, and Organismal Biology," was held December 8-9, 2006, in Santa Barbara, CA . Thirty-two participants representing fourteen professional societies and eleven other organizations assembled to work toward three goals:

Identify gaps between existing data centers and needs, including specific issues such as quality assurance procedures needed for contributions to centers, types of data that should be archived, etc.
Identify roles of professional societies, funders of research, and users of research in developing - or encouraging the development of - data centers, along with where data centers should be housed and who should operate and maintain them.
Assess likely cost to establish and maintain data centers required to meet community needs, including identification of potential funding mechanisms and models for data centers.

Click here to read the Data Centers Workshop Report.

Obstacles to Data Sharing Workshop

The third workshop, “Obstacles to Data Sharing in Ecology, Evolution, and Organismal Biology,” was held May 30-31, 2007, in Durham, NC. Thirty-nine participants representing nine professional societies and 22 other organizations assembled to work toward two goals:

Clearly delineate what barriers exist to data sharing, for example, intellectual property concerns, proprietary and confidential business information, handling of sensitive data such as locations of endangered species, lack of training in data sharing software, national or economic security concerns, etc.
Develop recommendations to reduce or eliminate those barriers, for example, publication policies that encourage or require data sharing, means of providing at least limited access to business or sensitive data, and development of easily accessible training programs.

Click here to read the Obstacles Workshop Report.

Incentives for Data Sharing Workshop

A fourth workshop, “Developing Incentives for Data Sharing in Ecology, Evolution, and Organismal Biology”, was held February 19-20, 2009, in Washington, DC. 24 participants representing researchers, publishers, and funders assembled to work toward two goals:

Identify incentives and recommend steps to overcome barriers to productive sharing of scientific information from the perspective of funders, researchers, and publishers.
Develop ideas for products that will help implement recommendations from the Data Sharing Workshop series.

Click hereto read the Incentives Workshop Report.

News and Announcements

5^th International Conference on Ecological Informatics, December 4 - 6, 2006, Santa Barbara, CA. Information available here.

Acknowledgement and Disclaimer

This material is based upon work supported by the National Science Foundation under Grants No. 0424702 and 0533052.

Any opinions, findings, and conclusions or recommendations expressed in this material are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views of the National Science Foundation.