This document has been archived and replaced by NSF 16-055 (http://www.nsf.gov/publications/pub_summ.jsp?ods_key=nsf16055). Title: Guidelines and Award Conditions for Scientific Data Date: December 3, 1998 National Science Foundation Office of Polar Programs 4201 Wilson Boulevard Arlington, VA 22230 December 3, 1998 Guidelines and Award Conditions for Scientific Data Purpose This statement provides guidelines from the Office of Polar Programs (OPP) at the National Science Foundation (NSF) and sets out special conditions applicable to OPP grants to implement the Foundation's Sharing Policy by assuring timely submission of OPP-award data to national data centers and other OPP-specified repositories for secondary use by the scientific community. The Office of Polar Programs, in conformance with NSF policy (see Grant Proposal Guide - GPG, Section VII-H), expects investigators to share with other researchers, at no more than incremental cost and within a reasonable time, the data, derived data products, samples, physical collections and other supported materials gathered or created in the course of the research project. The purpose of this policy is to facilitate full and open access to data and materials for polar research from projects supported by OPP. General Guidelines For all OPP supported projects: * All data and derived data products collected under OPP-awards which are appropriate for submission to a national data center or OPP specified data repository (OPP-approved website) should be promptly submitted within a reasonable amount of time, as described below, in responsibilities of Principal Investigators of OPP-Awards. * OPP considers the documentation of data sets, known as metadata, as vital to the exchange of information on polar research and to a data set's accessibility and longevity for reuse. * Data archives of OPP-supported projects should include easily accessible information about the data holdings, including quality assessments, supporting ancillary information, and guidance for locating and obtaining the data. * National and international standards should be used to the greatest extent possible for the collection, processing and communication of OPP-sponsored data sets. Special Note for Arctic Social Sciences Awards: The Arctic Social Sciences Program supports the full range of social science disciplines and adheres to the Data Sharing Policy developed by NSF's Directorate for Social Behavioral and Economic Research (SBER). The nature of the data, the way they are collected, analyzed, and stored, and the pace at which this occurs, vary widely. Different storage facilities and access requirements exist for different types of social science data, e.g., archaeological data, specimens from physical anthropology, large-scale survey data, oral interviews, and field records. Where appropriate and possible, grantees from all social science fields will develop and submit specific plans to share materials collected with NSF support. These plans should cover how and where these materials will be stored, at reasonable cost, and how access will be provided to other researchers, at their cost. Many complexities arise across the range of data collection supported by the Arctic Social Sciences Program. Therefore, such unusual circumstances and any necessary modifications or exemptions to the general policy of data sharing should be described in the OPP-awardees sharing plans. Responsibilities of Principal Investigators of OPP-Awards Principal investigators should make their data available to all reasonable requests (as specified in the NSF Grant Proposal Guide, Section VII-H) and where applicable the principal investigators should submit the data collected to designated data centers as soon as possible, but no later than two (2) years after the data are collected. For continuing observations, data inventories should be submitted periodically if and when there is a significant change in location, type or frequency of such observations. Principal investigators working in coordinated programs (multi-investigator and/or multi-agency programs) may (in consultation with the OPP program managers and other funding agencies involved) establish more stringent data submission procedures to meet the needs of these larger coordinated programs. PIs with OPP-awards should comply with data policies established for these coordinated programs and submit their data as required to the appropriate repository stipulated by the coordinated program office. Compliance with the data guidelines will be considered in the program managers overall evaluation of a Principal Investigator's prior support record. Conditions for OPP-Awards For all projects receiving funding in FY99, and for all subsequent projects, Principal Investigators of OPP-awards are REQUIRED to submit to appropriate electronic data directories, a description of their data (i.e. metadata) resulting from OPP funded research in the form of a Directory Interchange Format (DIF) entry. Principal investigators of OPP supported projects initiated prior to FY99 are strongly encouraged but not required to comply with DIF submission. Submission of the DIF may be at any time during the tenure of the grant. At the time of submission of the Final Report to NSF, a copy of the DIF must be sent to the cognizant program officer in OPP. Failure to provide final technical reports delays NSF review and processing of pending proposal for that PI. PIs should examine the formats of the required reports in advance to assure availability of required data. NSF has implemented a new electronic project reporting system, available through FastLane which permits electronic submission and updating of project reports, including information on: project participants (individual and organizational): activities and findings; publications; and, other specific products and contributions. Reports will continue to be required annually and after the expiration of the grant, but PIs will not need to re-enter information previously provided, either with the proposal or in earlier updates using the electronic system. Effective October 1, 1998, PIs are required to use the new reporting format for annual and final project reports. PIs are strongly encouraged to submit reports electronically via FastLane. For those PIs who cannot access FastLane, paper copies of the new report formats may be obtained from the NSF Clearinghouse as specified above. NSF expects to require electronic submission of all annual and final project reports via FastLane beginning in October 1999. Appropriate data directories for submission of DIFs are the Committee on Earth Observing Satellites/International Directory Network (CEOS/IDN) nodes. For OPP supported Antarctic projects, DIF submission should be to the Antarctic Master Directory, via the National Antarctic Data Coordination Center at http://www.usap-data.org/. Data sets from all OPP supported Antarctic Research projects should be submitted to the appropriate data center for the specific type of data collected. For OPP-supported Arctic projects, submission of DIFs should be to the Arctic System Science Data Coordination Center at http://arcss/colorado.edu. Principal investigators are also encouraged to submit information (metadata) on environmental data to the Arctic Environmental Data Directory (AEDD) project sponsored by the Interagency Arctic Research Policy Committee. Send information to http://www-ak.wr.usgs.gov/aedd. All appropriate and required data sets for the Arctic System Science Program (ARCSS) and the SCICEX program should also go to the Arctic System Science Data Coordination Center http://arcss.colorado.edu. Data sets from all other OPP supported Arctic scientific research should go to the appropriate data center for the specific type of data collected. Sample DIFs can be found on the Global Change Master Directory web page at http://gcmd.gsfc.nasa.gov. Any questions concerning this policy please contact the cognizant program officer in the Office of Polar Programs. Karl A. Erb Director Office of Polar Programs