FAQ on the topic of Research Data Management (RDM)

Research data management refers to the organization of generating, processing, storing and publishing research data.
RDM covers the entire research data life cycle: from project planning, data generation, data storage and metadata description and documentation to data archiving and subsequent use.

Further information can be found on the website What is Research Data Management (RDM)?

Research data management offers, among others, the following advantages:

Fulfilling the requirements of third-party funders: By creating a data management plan and developing and implementing it over the course of a research project, the requirements of third-party funders with regard to research data management are met.

Protection against data loss: Storing research data in repositories and long-term archives provides a secure way of preserving data and thus protects against unintentional data loss or misuse.

Possibility of better data organization: Research data management makes it possible to structure data even better, make it easier to understand, and prepare it with the help of metadata and digital tools. As a result, the data can be found and reused more easily.

Increased visibility in the academic world: Permanent citability and referenceability through so-called persistent identifiers increase one's visibility in the academic world.

Compliance with good scientific practice: Good research data management provides the researcher with evidence of independent scientific work as well as methodologically correct procedure in accordance with the guidelines for ensuring good scientific practice of the University of Tübingen as well as the DFG.

Subsequent use of data for follow-up projects: Through the use of services such as repositories, tools, persistent identifiers and interoperable interfaces, research data management offers the possibility of easy reuse and sharing of selected data for possible follow-up projects, alone or with others, demonstrating a responsible and sustainable use of one's research data.

Legal compliance: Good research data management offers legal compliance in regard to data protection, copyright, licensing and patent law by defining these aspects.

Research data management can be explicitly derived from the DFG's Guidelines for Safeguarding Good Scientific Practice and is therefore part of good scientific practice.

In the University of Tübingen Guidelines for Ensuring Good Scientific Practice (GWP), which the university has adopted and which are binding for all Tübingen researchers in order to avoid scientific misconduct, various processes in the data life cycle, such as the documentation of usage rights (guideline 10) and all results of a research process (guideline 12) as well as their publication (guideline 13) and ensuring the reusability and archiving of research data (guideline 17) are specifically named and made mandatory.

Further information can be found on the Good Scientific Practice website of the university.

The university's Core Facilities are central, cross-disciplinary and cross-faculty facilities that offer services and infrastructure in various areas for all researchers at the university. These services also include counseling on research data management and, depending on the focus of the respective Core Facility, other infrastructure services.

Three of the university's Core Facilities were established in 2012 with funding from the Excellence Initiative, and two more were set up in 2019 as part of the Excellence Strategy. The university's five Core Facilities are

• The Digital Humanities Center (DH Center) and the Methods Center in the Humanities and Social Sciences
• The Tübingen Structural Microscopy (TSM) and the Center for Light-Matter Interaction, Sensors & Analytics (LISA+) in the Natural Sciences
• The Center for Quantitative Biology (QBiC) in the Natural and Life Sciences

In addition to the five Core Facilities of the university, the Faculty of Medicine offers further core facilities that provide specific services in the field of life sciences. There are also some smaller core facilities within individual research networks, for example as part of clusters of excellence.

In late 2018, the Joint Science Conference of the federal and state governments decided to establish and fund a National Research Data Infrastructure (NFDI). A total of 26 consortia from various disciplines are funded. These NFDI consortia provide discipline-specific infrastructure to enable the best possible research data management (RDM) in the respective disciplines. This involves developing customized services for the respective research communities. At the same time, central interdisciplinary issues related to research data are discussed and future prospects defined. The aim is to establish a national information infrastructure for research data management.

The University of Tübingen is involved in the following NFDI consortia as co-applicant, participating institution, strategic collaborator or member organization:

    Text+, NFDI4Memory, NFDI4Objects and KonsortSWD in the Humanities and Social Sciences
    DAPHNE4NFDI, NFDI4Earth and NFDI4Objects in the Natural Sciences
    DataPLANT, GHGA, NFDI4Immuno and NFDI4Microbiota in the Life Sciences

Further information can be found on the website NFDI - National Research Data Infrastructure.

Structures and services for research data management outside the university are diverse and cannot be fully represented here. The following information is therefore a selection.

For Baden-Württemberg, the portal Forschungsdaten.info, which is provided by the state initiative bwFDM, offers a good starting point for obtaining information on the topic of RDM in Baden-Württemberg and beyond. The portal also explains basic terminology and offers useful tips as well as discipline-specific information.

Throughout Germany, the NFDI consortia, respectively the German National Research Data Infrastructure (NFDI), act as structuring initiatives. In addition, there are also state initiatives on RDM in other federal states. These are supplemented by transregional networks and other initiatives.

Internationally, there are a large number of different initiatives, offers and structures on the subject of RDM. The EOSC is particularly active across Europe. A list of international projects on the subject of RDM can be found at forschungsdaten.org.

Depending on the discipline and the overarching topic, the university offers different counseling services on the subject of RDM:

For overarching, discipline-specific advice, contact a Core Facility of the university relevant to your discipline and/or an NFDI consortium of your choice.

If you have questions about research data archiving, please contact the team of the Tübingen Research Data Repository FDAT by email or by phone 77848. 

Contact persons for RDM-related topics such as data storage, publishing, data protection, copyright and other subtopics can be found on the university's central RDM website under Contact Information.

If you do not know who to contact, please get in touch with the university's RDM officer by email rdmspam prevention@zv.uni-tuebingen.de or phone 75082.

A compilation of current training offers and events on the topic of RDM at the university and beyond can be found on the central RDM website at Events & Training Courses.

In addition to varying one-time formats, which are offered for example as part of the Postdoc Days, Research Funding Snacks or external events, the university provides insights into current developments in the field of RDM once a year as part of the Tübingen Days for Research Data Management. RDM courses can also be taken as target group-specific training courses. A modular course for postdocs and professors, which takes place once a year, offers in-depth insights into the field of RDM. A permanently available self-learning format is integrated into the course for doctoral students in the form of interactive videos, being also suitable for other target groups, designed to provide basic knowledge on RDM.

In addition to general or subject-related contacts in the field of RDM, which can be found under Contact Information on the central RDM website, as a researcher in the Humanities and Social Sciences you can also approach discipline-specific counseling services.

These are summarized on the information page RDM for Humanities and Social Sciences.
Please select a university Core Facility and/or an NFDI consortium relevant to your discipline to get advice.
Ongoing or completed research projects in the field of RDM within the Humanities and Social Sciences may offer additional expertise and services that could be suitable for RDM within your research project.

In addition to general or subject-related contacts in the field of RDM, which can be found under Contact Information on the central RDM website, as a researcher in the Natural Sciences you can also approach discipline-specific counseling services.

These are summarized on the information page RDM for Natural Sciences.
Please select a university Core Facility and/or an NFDI consortium relevant to your discipline to get advice.
Ongoing or completed research projects in the field of RDM within the Natural Sciences may offer additional expertise and services that could be suitable for RDM within your research project.

In addition to general or subject-related contacts in the field of RDM, which can be found under Contact Information on the central RDM website, as a researcher in the Life Sciences you can also approach discipline-specific counseling services.

These are summarized on the information page RDM for Life Sciences.
Please select a university Core Facility and/or an NFDI consortium relevant to your discipline to get advice.
Ongoing or completed research projects in the field of RDM within the Life Sciences may offer additional expertise and services that could be suitable for RDM within your research project.
Researchers at the Medical Faculty can also contact UKT facilities and counseling services.

In addition to general or subject-related contacts in the field of RDM, which can be found under Contact Information on the central RDM website, discipline-specific RDM information pages offer a compilation of facilities and projects that are particularly relevant to the respective research area. The information is divided into RDM for the Humanities and Social Sciences, RDM for the Natural Sciences and RDM for the Life Sciences.

The university also offers a modular RDM course for PhD students, which is permanently available as a self-study format and can also be attended once a year as an in-person lecture (as supplement or alternative).

As a PhD student, you may also contact the university's Graduate Academy, which is there to support and qualify researchers in early and mid-career phases (PhD students, postdocs, junior research group leaders, junior professors).

In addition to general or subject-related contacts in the field of RDM, which can be found under Contact Information on the central RDM website, discipline-specific RDM information pages offer a compilation of facilities and projects that are particularly relevant to the respective research area. The information is divided into RDM for the Humanities and Social Sciences, RDM for the Natural Sciences and RDM for the Life Sciences.

As a student, you may also contact the Dr. Eberle Center for Digital Competences. The center offers semester courses with up to 6 ECTS credits on methods and tools for the collection, processing, analysis, visualization, and sustainable storage of digital data.

A data management plan (DMP) describes the organization and structuring of research data within a specific research project. It covers various points, such as data storage, data publication, data security, and legal aspects related to the respective research data. Since a DMP is a “living document,” it can and should be updated and adapted during the course of the research project for which it was created.

With the help of the Research Data Management Organiser (RDMO), a data management plan (DMP) can be created in a structured manner for your own research, a project application, or even a larger collaborative project in accordance with the specifications of the respective funding agency. Depending on the selection of the template / funding agency, a questionnaire is created. By answering the questions relating to the respective project, an individual DMP is created, which is then available for download in various formats. The Tübingen RDMO instance can be used free of charge by all university employees with a ZDV user ID.

Alternatively, a DMP can also be created independently, for example using the elements of the DFG checklist.

Research data can be published in so-called repositories. By uploading your research data in a repository, you are complying with the requirements of good scientific practice (GWP) with regard to the publication, archiving, and reusability of your research. In addition, your data will be stored securely, annotated with metadata, and will be permanently retrievable through persistent identifiers. Ideally, by publishing your data in a repository, it thereby will comply with the FAIR principles and thus will meet the essential criteria for good data management.

With the Tübingen Research Data Archive (FDAT), the university offers a generic research data repository for researchers from all disciplines. Alternatively, you may use subject-specific repositories. You can find suitable repositories for your research data at re3data, for example.
By deciding early on which research data repository to want to use, you can prepare your data from the outset in such a way that you can publish it in the repository later with as little effort as possible. Take advantage of the counseling services offered by the respective repositories.

If you are unsure about how you would like to publish your research data and what access rights you would like to assign, seek advice by contacting the University Library on the topics of open access and copyright.

^{Disclaimer: the following information is not intended to replace legal consultation and is not supposed to address legal questions or problems that may arise in individual cases. The information is of a general nature and solely for information purposes. For advice on the topic of licensing law, please contact the Copyright Office of the University Library.}

If you do not label your research results in any way, copyright law generally applies in Germany above a certain level of creation, prohibiting others from using your research without your individual consent. However, within the framework of this copyright law, you can assign rights of use to other persons in the spirit of open science. This is done, for example, by attributing licenses.

Creative Commons Licenses (CC Licenses) are frequently used in this context, in version 4.0 international since 2013. An overview of the possible CC Licenses can be found on the website of the University Library. The university recommends attributing the open access compatible license types CC-BY 4.0 (use with reference to the author) or alternatively CC-BY-SA 4.0 (use with reference to the author and future attribution of this license, even for revised content).

If you should have any questions regarding licensing, please contact the University Library's Copyright Office for consultation.

Please note: CC licenses are not suitable for technical inventions related to software, trademarks, or patents. For advice on trademark and patent law, please contact the University's Technology Transfer Office.

^{Disclaimer: the following information is not intended to replace legal consultation and is not supposed to address legal questions or problems that may arise in individual cases. The information is of a general nature and solely for information purposes. For advice on the topic of data protection, please contact the University's Data Protection Officer or, as a member of the Medical Faculty, the Data Protection Officer of the University Hospital (UKT).}

In Germany, the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR/DSGVO) applies, which regulates how personal data should be handled.
Documents and information from the university on the subject of data protection are compiled on an information page. Here you will find guidelines from the President's Office on GDPR, on data protection policies, and on legal implementations, as well as further information and contact persons.

Information on data protection at universities can be found on the website of the Central Data Protection Office of the universities of Baden-Württemberg (ZENDAS). Various subtopics are listed there in a keyword list.

For individual counseling, please contact the University's Data Protection Officer. As a member of the Faculty of Medicine, please contact the Data Protection Officer of the University Hospital (UKT).

For high volumes of data, which generally require greater computing power for processing, high-performance (cloud) computing (HPC) can be used. HPC services are equipped with high computing power as well as storage capacity in order to be able to process large amounts of data quickly. For this purpose, computing processes run in parallel with each other.

The university is part of the Baden-Württemberg bwHPC initiative. The services offered by this initiative enable researchers at universities in Baden-Württemberg to use shared infrastructure for high-performance computing. Training courses on HPC are also offered on a regular basis.

The requirements of funding agencies regarding RDM can vary in terms of detail and scope. The deadlines for submitting information can also be variable: often, different information must be provided when submitting an application, during the course of the project, and/or at the end of a project. Therefore, before submitting your application, check with your respective funding agency regarding the specific requirements and take a close look at the required application documents in advance. Many funding agencies provide templates with helpful information on what details are required at which point in the course of the project.

In general, it is advisable to create a data management plan (DMP), for example with the help of RDMO.
For DFG applications, you will find information and contact persons on the topic of RDM in DFG projects on their webpage Handling of Research Data.

Further information on this topic can also be found on the university's website Research Data Management (RDM) for Third-Party Applications.

Whether funding for RDM can be applied for depends on the respective funding agency and funding format. Therefore, before submitting an application, please check with your respective funding agency regarding the specific options and requirements, and take a close look at the required application documents in advance.

For DFG applications, funds can be requested for consumables as well as personnel expenses related to RDM. However, this is subject to certain conditions, which are listed on the DFG's webpage on Information on the resources available.

In any case, please contact the university's Research Support in advance before applying for personnel funds for RDM.

Further information on this topic can also be found on the university's website on Research Data Management (RDM) for Third-Party Applications.