Research Data Services (RDS) helps UCSB researchers manage and preserve their research data through consultations, long-term engagements, and instructional workshops. Our team offers support across the research data lifecycle, from pre-project planning to post-project archival, connecting researchers with both locally- and externally-provided curation services. Our goal is to ensure that all research data is well-described, FAIR (Findable, Accessible, Interoperable, Reusable), and sustainably preservable, and that researchers receive scholarly credit for sharing and publishing data.

We offer the following services:

Planning

  • Data management planning and proposal assistance
  • Funder data management requirements
  • Using the DMPTool

Day-to-day management

  • Best practices in data management
  • Data management tools and services
  • Metadata standards
  • Metadata population and extraction strategies

Publication

  • Data publication journals
  • Obtaining persistent identifiers for data
  • Data citation formats
  • Data copyright and licenses

Preservation/archival

  • Selection and usage of data repositories
  • Dryad Data Repository

We are available for consultation and teaching as well as deeper engagements with research projects.