Sharing data is not just a nice thing to do, it also benefits fellow researchers, encourages a robust scientific ecosystem, and improves information access in our society. Shared data can be re-used in future research, replicated to ensure validity, and is accessible to the public. Most federal funding agencies now require grantees to have a plan for sharing data and many publishers require data to be shared at the publication stage. This is so shared data can be re-used in future research, replicated to ensure validity, and be accessible to the public. For more information on data sharing, see our Research Data management guide and our guide to Data Repositories. 

Procedures for sharing data should be covered in the Data Management Plan (DMP) submitted with the grant application. This should include where data will be deposited for sharing and outline any necessary costs to curating and preparing the data.

NSF: Grantees are expected to share their data within a reasonable time-frame, and you are required to include a data sharing plan in your DMP. 

NIH: As of January 25, 2023, all grant applications for research projects that generate scientific data to the NIH must include details on how data will be shared in the data management plan. Grantees are expected to share their data at the conclusion of their research project. 

There may also be specific requirements based on the directorate or institute issuing the grant. NSF and NIH, for example, have their own requirements. 

The following resources and tools can help you share, publish, cite and preserve your research data.

To make your data more accessible, you can deposit it in a general or discipline-specific repository. Temple has an institutional repository: TUScholarShare.

Shared data can be cited and reused, thus strengthening the research community. DOIs (digital object identifiers) created by publishers and repositories make citing and linking to data easy.

Preserving your data is an important step in the research process, and following good data management practices throughout the research process will make it easy to preserve your data, methods, and analysis. Depositing your data in a repository is one step in preserving your data, but you should also try to follow good practices and deposit additional copies of your data in repositories in different geographic locations. For any physical specimens and materials, contact your department for help in finding appropriate places to deposit them.

Check out our guide to data repositories

NSF data sharing policy