(Linked) Data Curation challenges

Kevin AshleyDirector, Digital Curation Centre

www.dcc.ac.ukKevin.ashley@ed.ac.uk

Reusable with attribution: CC-BYThe DCC is supported by Jisc

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Acknowledgements

• John Wilkins & Cameron Neylon• Ideas, images, slides, inspiration

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Data views and processes

• Administration• Discovery• Work-level description• Discipline-level interpretation

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Administrative view

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Data from projects funded by NERC

Data produced by the department of linguistics

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Discovery view

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Data about reproductive behaviour in freshwater fish

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Work-level description

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Data is variable

• Not always textual• Not always tabular• Not always fixed• Not always clearly authored – think of archival

provenance• Not always associated with publication

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Kevin Ashley – CC-BY 10http://www.flickr.com/photos/sethw/113073189/

95% of research results are never published

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If a million postdocs repeat a million experiments…

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And 25% of those don’t work…

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…how much taxpayer’s money is that?

http://flickr.com/photos/luismimunoznajar/2093185804/2013-07-05

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I need that data now!!! I don’t care how messy it is – I

can fix it!

I’ve wasted too much of my life fixing other’s people’s bad

data. I’m not interested until you’ve cleaned it up and

documented it. Besides, I have other things to think about

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Grandfather’s axe

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coconinoco@flickr.com CC-BY-NC-SA

When is my dataset a new dataset?

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Authorship

• Reference data – cell-level provenance versus single author data table

• ‘Cleaned’ data – can pass through many hands• Synthesis…

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Potential wins

• Provenance of machine-gathered data – linking observations to instrument descriptions

• Linking data in multiple places• Data and publications and plans• Robust assertions about data versioning• Association of data with institutions

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networks of people…2013-07-05

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More wins

• Assertions at table and variable group level• Linking that crosses disciplinary boundaries:– Biochemistry and neuroscience– Naval history, economics and climate science

• Linking that crosses research and administrative boundaries

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IGFBP-5 plays a role in the regulation of cellular senescence via a p53-dependent pathway and in aging-associated vascular diseases

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After John WIlbanks

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Tylenol

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N-acetyl-p-aminophenolAcetaminophen

ParacetamolSameAsN-(4-hydroxyphenyl)ethanamideN-(4-hydroxyphenyl)acetamide

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“I never had an idea that couldn’t be improved by sharing it with as

many people as possible…”

Bill Hooker (2006)http://3quarksdaily.blogs.com/3quarksdaily/2006/10/the_future_of_s_1.html

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IdeaDevelo

p

Fund

PlanRecor

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Process

Publish

Read

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IdeaDevelo

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Fund

PlanRecor

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Process

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IdeaDevelo

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Challenge? Opportunity

• Linked data can improve administration of research and research data

• The real potential is in improving research quality and efficiency

• The same actors can’t do both• The actions don’t need to be in lock-step

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