From Bench to Brain: A Metadata-driven Approach to Research Data Management in a Collaborative Neuroscientific Research Center
Research data management (RDM) is key to fast and effective cooperation in collaborative research projects, especially when several scientific disciplines are involved. Critical steps in RDM are the agreement and implementation of common standards for metadata and data storage. The practice paper ou...
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| Format: | Article |
| Language: | English |
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Ubiquity Press
2025-01-01
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| Series: | Data Science Journal |
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| Online Access: | https://account.datascience.codata.org/index.php/up-j-dsj/article/view/1762 |
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| _version_ | 1823859350147432448 |
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| author | Marlene Pacharra Tobias Otto Nina Olivia Caroline Winter |
| author_facet | Marlene Pacharra Tobias Otto Nina Olivia Caroline Winter |
| author_sort | Marlene Pacharra |
| collection | DOAJ |
| description | Research data management (RDM) is key to fast and effective cooperation in collaborative research projects, especially when several scientific disciplines are involved. Critical steps in RDM are the agreement and implementation of common standards for metadata and data storage. The practice paper outlines the approach of the interdisciplinary Collaborative Research Center (CRC) 1280 ‘Extinction Learning’ with 81 researchers from biology, psychology, medicine, and computational neuroscience across four different institutions. This framework can serve as a transferable model for other collaborative research initiatives lacking predefined metadata schemas or repositories. Specifically, the iterative process of agreeing on 16 metadata fields that correspond most highly with the involved research disciplines for collaboration is discussed. To increase reusability, mappings to the Dublin Core and DataCite bibliometric standards were established for descriptive metadata fields. Moreover, we deploy controlled vocabularies and terminology tailored to the respective disciplines and to the organizational structure of the CRC. Using this metadata schema, neuroscientific data from more than 3,200 human subjects and lab animals are currently shared within the CRC. To enable implementation of this schema in active research, open-source applications have been developed that store metadata as local JSON files along with research data and make metadata searchable. The development of the metadata schema and its subsequent use are illustrated with particular emphasis on design principles that allow for reuse in other RDM domains and the lessons learned. |
| format | Article |
| id | doaj-art-b97d4a91013f4a2e809a5a033f53e410 |
| institution | Kabale University |
| issn | 1683-1470 |
| language | English |
| publishDate | 2025-01-01 |
| publisher | Ubiquity Press |
| record_format | Article |
| series | Data Science Journal |
| spelling | doaj-art-b97d4a91013f4a2e809a5a033f53e4102025-02-11T05:32:15ZengUbiquity PressData Science Journal1683-14702025-01-01242210.5334/dsj-2025-0021762From Bench to Brain: A Metadata-driven Approach to Research Data Management in a Collaborative Neuroscientific Research CenterMarlene Pacharra0https://orcid.org/0000-0001-6602-6746Tobias Otto1https://orcid.org/0000-0002-9994-0910Nina Olivia Caroline Winter2https://orcid.org/0000-0003-2966-4057CRC 1280 “Extinction Learning”, Biopsychology, Ruhr University BochumCognitive Psychology, Ruhr University BochumIT.SERVICES, Ruhr University BochumResearch data management (RDM) is key to fast and effective cooperation in collaborative research projects, especially when several scientific disciplines are involved. Critical steps in RDM are the agreement and implementation of common standards for metadata and data storage. The practice paper outlines the approach of the interdisciplinary Collaborative Research Center (CRC) 1280 ‘Extinction Learning’ with 81 researchers from biology, psychology, medicine, and computational neuroscience across four different institutions. This framework can serve as a transferable model for other collaborative research initiatives lacking predefined metadata schemas or repositories. Specifically, the iterative process of agreeing on 16 metadata fields that correspond most highly with the involved research disciplines for collaboration is discussed. To increase reusability, mappings to the Dublin Core and DataCite bibliometric standards were established for descriptive metadata fields. Moreover, we deploy controlled vocabularies and terminology tailored to the respective disciplines and to the organizational structure of the CRC. Using this metadata schema, neuroscientific data from more than 3,200 human subjects and lab animals are currently shared within the CRC. To enable implementation of this schema in active research, open-source applications have been developed that store metadata as local JSON files along with research data and make metadata searchable. The development of the metadata schema and its subsequent use are illustrated with particular emphasis on design principles that allow for reuse in other RDM domains and the lessons learned.https://account.datascience.codata.org/index.php/up-j-dsj/article/view/1762research data managementcollaborationinterdisciplinarityneurosciencemetadatadublin coredataciteopen sourceapplication software |
| spellingShingle | Marlene Pacharra Tobias Otto Nina Olivia Caroline Winter From Bench to Brain: A Metadata-driven Approach to Research Data Management in a Collaborative Neuroscientific Research Center Data Science Journal research data management collaboration interdisciplinarity neuroscience metadata dublin core datacite open source application software |
| title | From Bench to Brain: A Metadata-driven Approach to Research Data Management in a Collaborative Neuroscientific Research Center |
| title_full | From Bench to Brain: A Metadata-driven Approach to Research Data Management in a Collaborative Neuroscientific Research Center |
| title_fullStr | From Bench to Brain: A Metadata-driven Approach to Research Data Management in a Collaborative Neuroscientific Research Center |
| title_full_unstemmed | From Bench to Brain: A Metadata-driven Approach to Research Data Management in a Collaborative Neuroscientific Research Center |
| title_short | From Bench to Brain: A Metadata-driven Approach to Research Data Management in a Collaborative Neuroscientific Research Center |
| title_sort | from bench to brain a metadata driven approach to research data management in a collaborative neuroscientific research center |
| topic | research data management collaboration interdisciplinarity neuroscience metadata dublin core datacite open source application software |
| url | https://account.datascience.codata.org/index.php/up-j-dsj/article/view/1762 |
| work_keys_str_mv | AT marlenepacharra frombenchtobrainametadatadrivenapproachtoresearchdatamanagementinacollaborativeneuroscientificresearchcenter AT tobiasotto frombenchtobrainametadatadrivenapproachtoresearchdatamanagementinacollaborativeneuroscientificresearchcenter AT ninaoliviacarolinewinter frombenchtobrainametadatadrivenapproachtoresearchdatamanagementinacollaborativeneuroscientificresearchcenter |