Development of an Integrated Lifecycle of RDM tools

KU Leuven decided in 2018 to create an ecosystem of RDM tools to enable researchers to  manage their data well and in a FAIR way. In 2018, KU Leuven started on the road to an institutional data repository, which resulted in the launch of the Dataverse-based “RDR” in January 2022. In parallel, there was also a strong focus on tools to manage data in a structured and metadata-rich way during the research project. In this context, an iRODS instance that enables easy and integrated metadata management from the start of a research project via a self-developed portal was launched in March 2023, called “ManGO”.

KU Leuven further supports a varied landscape of RDM tools, including OSF, GitLab, REDCap, and SharePoint. As one of the four FAIR principles is interoperability, the aim is to connect as many tools to RDR and ManGO as possible, with the connection between ManGO and RDR being crucial to facilitate easy transfer of data for publication. The future holds further work to improve ManGO and RDR as well as further and more extensive integrations between as many RDM tools as possible, by enabling metadata and data exchange where feasible. Work is also underway to launch a cold storage option for data that is not published but should be archived. As with ManGO and RDR, KU Leuven will continue to share its work in open source to ensure the investments made in RDM tool development can also be used by and is accessible to other institutions.