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Research data

Research data policy

Data availability statements

Guidance for authors and editors

An article’s data availability statement lets a reader know where and how to access data that support the results and analysis. It may include links to publicly accessible datasets that were analysed or generated during the study, descriptions of what data are available and/or information on how to access data that is not publicly available.

The data availability statement is a valuable link between a paper’s results and the supporting evidence. PվƵ’s data policy is based on transparency, requiring these statements in original research articles across our journals.

The guidance below offers advice on how to create a data availability statement, along with examples from different research areas.

Data availability statements support research data

What should a data availability statement include?

Your data availability statement should describe how the data supporting the results reported in your paper can be accessed. 

  • If your data are in a repository, include hyperlinks and persistent identifiers (e.g. DOI or accession number) for the data where available.  
  • If your data cannot be shared openly, for example to protect study participant privacy, then this should be explained. 
  • Include both original data generated in your research and any secondary data reuse that supports your results and analyses.

Read our detailed guidance on how to .

Citing data sources

You should cite any publicly available data on which the conclusions of the paper rely. This includes novel data shared alongside the publication and any secondary data sources. 

Data citations should include a persistent identifier (such as a DOI), should be included in the reference list using the minimum information recommended by DataCite (Dataset Creator, Dataset Title, Publisher [repository], Publication Year, Identifier [e.g. DOI, Handle or ARK]) and follow journal style.

See our .

Statement examples by research area 

Life sciences and clinical medicine

Data publicly available in a repository:

  • PRO-Seq data were deposited into the Gene Expression Omnibus database under accession number GSE85337 and are available at the following URL: . Example from:
  • The experimental data and the simulation results that support the findings of this study are available in Figshare with the identifier . Example from:
  • The anonymised data collected are available as open data via the University of Bristol online data repository: . Example from:  

Data available with the paper or supplementary information:

  • All data supporting the findings of this study are available within the paper and its Supplementary Information. Microsatellite primer sequences are provided in Supplementary Table 2, along with original reference describing the microsatellites used in this study. Example from:
  • All data on the measured ecosystem variables indicating ecosystem functions that support the findings of this study are included within this paper and its Supplementary Information files. Example from:

Data cannot be shared openly but are available on request from authors:

  • The data that support the findings of this study are not openly available due to reasons of sensitivity and are available from the corresponding author upon reasonable request. Data are located in controlled access data storage at Karolinska Institutet. Example from:
  • The data that support the findings of this study are available from the authors but restrictions apply to the availability of these data, which were used under license from the Natural History Museum (London) for the current study, and so are not publicly available. Data are, however, available from the authors upon reasonable request and with permission from the Centre for Human Evolution Studies at the Natural History Museum. Example from:

Chemistry and chemical biology

Data publicly available in a repository:

  • Crystallographic data for the structures reported in this article have been deposited at the Cambridge Crystallographic Data Centre, under deposition numbers CCDC  (1), (3), (4), (5), (6) and (7). Copies of the data can be obtained free of charge via . All other relevant data generated and analysed during this study, which include experimental, spectroscopic, crystallographic and computational data, are included in this article and its supplementary information.  are provided with this paper. Example from:
  • The raw transient absorption data (including the anisotropy measurements), Raman and ultraviolet–visible spectra, and computational data that support the findings of this study are available in the Edinburgh DataShare repository with the identifier . Example from:

Data available with the paper or supplementary information:

  • The authors declare that the data supporting the findings of this study are available within the paper and its . Should any raw data files be needed in another format they are available from the corresponding author upon reasonable request. are provided with this paper. Example from:

Physical sciences

Data publicly available in a repository:

  • The dataset on global land precipitation source and evapotranspiration sink is available at . The MODIS LAI C6 product is available at . GPCP v.2.3 precipitation data are available at . GLEAM v.3.3a evapotranspiration data are available at . Air temperature and wind speed from ERA5 are available at . Surface radiation (CERES_SYN1deg_Ed4.1) data are available at . SST from NOAA Optimum Interpolation v.2 is available at . Snow-cover product is available at . Elevation data are available at .

Data available with the paper or supplementary information:

  • The authors declare that the data supporting the findings of this study are available within the paper, its supplementary information files, and the National Tibetan Plateau Data Center ().

Data cannot be shared openly but are available on request from authors:

  • Data sets generated during the current study are available from the corresponding author on reasonable request. The natural gas production data are available from Drilling Info but restrictions apply to the availability of these data, which were used under license for the current study, and so are not publicly available. Example from:

Humanities and social science

Data publicly available in a repository:

  • The datasets generated by the survey research during and/or analyzed during the current study are available in the Dataverse repository, .” Example from:
  • The Greek Hippocratic texts used in this study are available to the public under a Creative Commons license at A Digital Corpus for Graeco-Arabic Studies: . Example from:

Data available in a repository with restricted access:

  • The Heinz et al. data are available from the Inter-University Consortium of Political and Social Research at . Our custom data are available in the Open Science Framework repository at . Example from:
  • The raw CoVIDA and HBS data are protected and are not available due to data privacy laws. The processed data sets are available at OPENICPSR under accession code 14212129 (). Example from:

Data cannot be shared openly but are available on request from authors:

  • The data that support the findings of this study are available from Norwegian Social Research (NOVA), but restrictions apply to the availability of these data, which were used under licence for the current study and so are not publicly available. The data are, however, available from the authors upon reasonable request and with the permission of Norwegian Social Research (NOVA). Example from:

Data shared with manuscript or Supplementary Information:

  • The author confirms that all data generated or analysed during this study are included in this published article. Example from:

Data sharing is not applicable:

  • We do not analyse or generate any datasets, because our work proceeds within a theoretical and mathematical approach. Example from: