Getting a citation for your data (DOIs for data)

Data producers can now receive due academic credit for the data that they produce through the assigning of Digital Object Identifiers (DOIs) to their data when it is held in a recognised repository, such as the CEDA data centres. 

Publishers are increasingly requesting that researchers ensure that their data are lodged in a recognised data repository, preferably with DOIs assigned to the data to aid linking the published article and the referenced data resource. CEDA can assist with such requests.

DOIs can also be used to formally cite datasets in the same way as a researcher would cite a journal article.

Finding out about DOIs

NERC has guidelines for scientists on how to get a DOI available through its website here. This guide has useful answers to commonly asked questions such as: Why should I get a DOI for my dataset and how does it benefit me?

What can CEDA do?

CEDA is able to assign DOIs to datasets held within its archives. In order to do this the data must be:

1. Complete  - the data can be a whole dataset or this can apply to part of a continuously produced dataset, e.g. for a year's worth of data that are complete.
2. Unchanging - whereby the actual content is fixed and will not be further amended to correct for inconsistencies etc.
3. Properly archived in a persistent location - such as the archives held by CEDA.
4. Have all the necessary information about the dataset to compile a suitable CEDA dataset catalogue page. This forms the DOI landing page to which the DOI will resolve and bring the person following the DOI to the referenced resource.

CEDA data scientists will work with you to ensure that your data meet these criteria. While this may also necessitate some additional work on your behalf we'll try to guide you through the process and make it as easy as possible.

How long will it take to get a DOI?

This will depend on the work needed to ensure the data and associated dataset catalogue page are suitably in place for the DOI landing page to be created. 

In all cases we recommend that you contact CEDA at the earliest available opportunity to discuss your requirements  as we may not be able to meet short deadlines.

Data already held by CEDA:

Assuming data are already held in the CEDA archive with a suitable datasets catalogue entry, a DOI can usually be issued within 1 working day.

There may, however, be some additional delays to this, typically where additional background informaiton is required to ensure the dataset catalogue page is sufficiently populated.

Data not held by CEDA/not complete:

If a complete set of data are not held by CEDA in one of our data centres then additional work will need to take place. Please see the other parts of the Archiving Data With CEDA guide for depositors on the CEDA site for further information. This guide will help you to determine if we are are a suitable archive for your data, how to prepare a data mangement plan and the process of archiving data with us. 

Further Information

More information about DOIs and on process to obtain a DOI can be found on the  NERC DOI page.