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Data: Research Data

Research Data Overview

What is research data?

Data collected, created, or generated as part of a research project. Datasets are increasingly being recognized as standalone scholarly publications. 

Is research data available to me? 

Sometimes! More and more researchers are making their data openly accessible online.

Where can I find research data?

The most common ways to find research data are:

  • searching within a research data repository
  • using a tool that searches across different research data repositories
  • exploring data journals and data papers
    • data journals: focus on the publication of datasets and their accompanying data papers
    • data papers: thoroughly describe a dataset and provide contextual information, such as collection methodologies

Find research data

Find a repository

Use a registry like re3data to identify which repositories publish data on your topic.

Find a dataset

Use a tool like DataCite to search for datasets across different repositories. 

Featured Repository