Dartmouth College Teams with Edge to Bring IEEE DataPort to Their Researchers for Data Management and Storage

Many institutions continue to expand their research capabilities and build an ecosystem that helps advance innovation and discovery for all members of the research community. Finding effective data management solutions that allow researchers to store and share data has become increasingly important in achieving this mission and helping these innovators shine a light on the transformative work they’re conducting in their fields of study. In August 2021, Edge partnered with IEEE to increase awareness of institutional subscriptions to the web-based, cloud services platform, IEEE DataPort^TM, which supports the data-related needs of the global technical community. Researchers from academic, government, and not-for-profit institutions can leverage this platform to efficiently store, share, access, and manage research data.

Supporting Collaborative Research

Dartmouth College recently selected an institutional subscription to the full-service data platform to meet their institution’s growing data needs. “Edge is pleased to have the opportunity to work with IEEE in bringing IEEE DataPort^TM to researchers at Dartmouth College,” says Dr. Forough Ghahramani, Assistant Vice President for Research, Innovation, and Sponsored Programs at Edge. “As research in nearly all domains becomes more data intensive, providing institutions with the ability to store, share, access, and manage high quality data is critical. The partnership between Edge and IEEE facilitates that opportunity and advances the mission of EdgeDiscovery, a research and discovery framework providing access to leading-edge technology to support collaborative research and educational opportunities.”

Along with gaining access to more than 3,800 research data sets, researchers at subscribing institutions have the ability to collaborate with more than three million global IEEE users and dramatically increase the exposure of their research efforts to a worldwide peer audience. With cloud storage up to 2TB for individual users or up to 10TB per dataset, an organization can consolidate their institution’s research data in one trusted location and create a custom dashboard with easy access to uploaded datasets. The platform also enables institutions to link their dataset to their published paper and meet funding agency requirements for the use of and sharing of data.

Promoting Open Science

As the world’s largest technical professional organization dedicated to advancing technology, IEEE is committed to helping drive global innovation through broad collaboration and the sharing of knowledge. Like IEEE, Edge continually looks for opportunities to help institutions both large and small build research collaborations and gain access to a broad range of multi-institutional local, regional, and national advanced technology resources. Through IEEE DataPort^TM, Edge hopes to help more institutions expand their open data initiatives and form affinity groups based on their research interests.

More and more institutions are recognizing the benefits of open research practices. In particular, open access articles are often associated with higher citation rates and an esteemed peer review process, as well as gaining more media coverage, funding opportunities, and access to connections within the research community. To be eligible for funding, many agencies require an institution’s data to be accessible to anyone and IEEE DataPort^TM allows users to publish data with various levels of access, including Open Access. Institutions may also need to have an established plan for managing and storing data. Uploading data to IEEE DataPort^TM not only ensures all datasets will be freely accessible to an institution’s current researchers and industry professionals, but preserves that content for future accessibility and experimental reproducibility. Along with the data, users can upload scripts, instructional documentations, data visualizations, and research methodology. Organizations can use IEEE DataPort^TM to help comply with funding agency data requirements, and by following these best practices, be better positioned for future funding.

Meeting Growing Data Needs

To meet growing data needs and help expand the reach of their initiatives, institutions can choose from two IEEE DataPort^TM subscription options. The Basic Institutional Subscription includes access to all datasets published on IEEE DataPort^TM and an unlimited number of non-Open Access dataset uploads. The Premium Institutional Subscription offers these benefits, as well as twenty Open Access dataset uploads, access to a Data Management Plan tool within IEEE DataPort^TM, and allows datasets to be made private so they are accessible only to defined groups. When uploading a dataset, users can tag the data using keywords and categories and will be able to see how much exposure a dataset is experiencing through a clear view counter.

With a goal of providing a global data platform that fully supports Open Data initiatives, IEEE DataPort^TM was developed to give the research community the ability to manage, share, access, and store research data indefinitely. With this greater visibility and transparency, there are often more opportunities for a global network of researchers to connect and approach the data in new and exciting ways. As more institutions join forces to support the broader understanding of data and uncover the real-world impact of their research efforts, there will be more fertile ground for untapped discovery and innovation.

Existing Edge members and other North American academic and government institutions interested in learning more about IEEE DataPort^TM can contact Edge at ieeedataport@njedge.net.