London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine - Case study in funding research data management

This case study was written by Mary Donaldson and Gareth Knight as part of the Funder Requirements for Research Data project. This project was funded by JISC as part of the wider Research Data Management Business Case and Costings (RDM-BCC) project. The case study examines how the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine supports RDM, how their service sustainability is achieved, and how other RDM activities are paid for

Building a research data management service for the London school of hygiene & tropical medicine

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to present a case study of work performed at the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine to set-up a Research Data Management Service and tailor it to the needs of health researchers. Design/methodology/approach – The paper describes the motivations for establishing the RDM Service and outlines the three objectives that were set to improve data management practice within the institution. Each of the objectives are explored in turn, stating how they were addressed. Findings – A university with limited resources can operate a RDM Service that pro-actively supports researchers wishing to manage research data by monitoring evolving support needs, identifying common trends and developing resources that will reduce the time investment needed. The institution-wide survey identified a need for guidance on developing data documentation and archiving research data following project completion. Analysis of ongoing support requests identifies a need for guidance on data management plans and complying with journal sharing requirements. Research limitations/implications – The paper provides a case study of a single institution. The results may not be generally applicable to universities that support other disciplines. Practical implications – The case study may be helpful in helping other universities to establish an RDM Service using limited resources. Originality/value – The paper outlines how the evolving data management needs of public health researchers can be identified and a strategy that can be adopted by an RDM Service to efficiently address these requirements. </jats:sec

LSHTM Data Compass Statistics Report - 2015

Download figures for LSHTM Data Compass during the repository’s testing phase in May-June 2015 and following its launch in July 2015. Data covers the number of downloads per month, the most downloaded items in the repository, and the most popular authors on the basis of downloads

LSHTM - EPSRC Research Data Management Compliance Report

This report describes the approach taken by the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine to enhance data management practice within the institution and fulfil expectations published by the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC)

Report on the “Digital Preservation - The Planets Way” Workshop

A report on the Planets a “Digital Preservation – The Planets Way” workshop, which took place on June 22-24, 2009 at the Royal Library, Copenhagen, Denmark. The workshop brought together representatives from archives, libraries, museums, academia, media and other institutions to consider the activities necessary to maintain content in the long-term and establish the methodologies and software tools developed by the EU-funded PLANETS project as a potential solution for preservation concerns. The event was the first of a series of three-day workshops that the Planets (Preservation and Long-term Access through NETworked Services) project is organizing across Europe during 2009-2010

From 'House of Caves' to nexus of central England: Nottingham, c. AD 650-1250 - Future Research Directions’

Nottingham, as one of the Five Boroughs of the Danelaw, a key strategic pre-Conquest borough, and the most important royal governmental hub in central England by the time of the Angevin kings, from Henry II to John (1154–1216), is a city with a fascinating story to tell. However, the study of its origins and early development has been somewhat neglected. A major contributory factor is that key archaeological excavations undertaken in the city between 1969 and 1980 remain unpublished, while since 1980, the outcomes of development-led excavation have not provided sufficient opportunities to investigate key areas on an equal scale. In the last few years, preliminary evaluation of material from the unpublished excavations under the aegis of the Origins of Nottingham project and an increase in archaeological investigation has again started to highlight the wealth of potential insight to be gained from the archaeological deposits preserved beneath Nottingham’s streets. Exploring and interpreting these remains are crucial if we are tostart to understand Nottingham’s growth and significance as a major urban settlement in medieval central England between the seventh and thirteenth centuries

Data Without Meaning: Establishing the Significant Properties of Digital Research

It is well recognised that the period of time in which digital research may remain accessible is likely to be short in comparison to the period in which it will continue to hold intellectual value. Although many digital preservation strategies are effective for simple resources, it is not always possible to confirm that all of the significant properties - the characteristics that contribute to the intended meaning - have been maintained when stored in different formats and software environments. The paper outlines methodologies being developed by InterPARES, PLANETS and other projects in the international research community to support the decision-making process and highlights the work of four recent JISC-funded studies to specify the significant properties of vector images, moving images, software and learning objects

Modelling OAIS Compliance for Disaggregated Preservation Services

The reference model for the Open Archival Information System (OAIS) is well established in the research community as a method of modelling the functions of a digital repository and as a basis in which to frame digital curation and preservation issues. In reference to the 5th anniversary review of the OAIS, it is timely to consider how it may be interpreted by an institutional repository. The paper examines methods of sharing essential functions and requirements of an OAIS between two or more institutions, outlining the practical considerations of outsourcing. It also details the approach taken by the SHERPA DP Project to introduce a disaggregated service model for institutional repositories that wish to implement preservation services

What to Preserve?: Significant Properties of Digital Objects

This article reports on the JISC/BL/DPC workshop on significant properties, which took place on April 7, 2008 at the British Library Conference Centre, London. The intention of the workshop was to bring together the relevant projects and report on progress to date. It was also hoped that the workshop will lead to collective recommendations for future areas of research and development

Working memory replay prioritizes weakly attended events

One view of working memory posits that maintaining a series of events requires their sequential and equal mnemonic replay. Another view is that the content of working memory maintenance is prioritized by attention. We decoded the dynamics for retaining a sequence of items using magnetoencephalography, wherein participants encoded sequences of three stimuli depicting a face, a manufactured object, or a natural item and maintained them in working memory for 5000 ms. Memory for sequence position and stimulus details were probed at the end of the maintenance period. Decoding of brain activity revealed that one of the three stimuli dominated maintenance independent of its sequence position or category; and memory was enhanced for the selectively replayed stimulus. Analysis of event-related responses during the encoding of the sequence showed that the selectively replayed stimuli were determined by the degree of attention at encoding. The selectively replayed stimuli had the weakest initial encoding indexed by weaker visual attention signals at encoding. These findings do not rule out sequential mnemonic replay but reveal that attention influences the content of working memory maintenance by prioritizing replay of weakly encoded events. We propose that the prioritization of weakly encoded stimuli protects them from interference during the maintenance period, whereas the more strongly encoded stimuli can be retrieved from long-term memory at the end of the delay period