January 2022 Issue of Learned Publishing is Available Now

Learned Publishing: Volume 35, No 1, January 2022

This year’s themed issue ambitiously addresses the topic of research data – specifically, what role scholarly publishers should play in the preservation and distribution of data generated by original research.

As we discuss in the issue’s editorial, this is a deceptively complicated and wide-reaching topic—as the promise of future time and cost savings, or faster routes to new scientific discoveries, depends on a robust, cooperative data-management infrastructure across our global research and scholarly communications value chains.

Contributors to this issue represent diverse regional and stakeholder perspectives on publishers’ role in furthering efforts to standardize and accelerate research data sharing:

• Aki MacFarlane of the Wellcome Trust addresses publishers directly in her call for increased efforts to support those research practices that encourage the reusability and distribution, and thereby the value, of research data.
• Eefke Smit and Joris van Rossum reflect on STM’s Research Data Program as it enters its 3rd year – which has successfully offered publishers a clear roadmap to engage with research data dissemination.
• Leading metadata champions, Helena Cousijn, Ted Habermann, Elizabeth Krznarich, and Alice Meadows, demonstrate the value of persistent identifiers (PIDs) to connect openly available data to its associated published materials.
• Dr. Duan’s team make the case that our biggest challenge may lie with the consumers of shared data and outline 21 recommendations for researcher-friendly data management and re-use practices.
• In a review of Chinese journal data policies, we can see where publishers might be a weak link in the supply chain and how researchers lack guidance on data sharing from those who disseminate their research results as articles.

Perhaps of most value are the case studies from publishers (such as Taylor & Francis), funders (like those belonging to the Association for Medical Research Charities), and researchers (such as members of the Chinese Academy of Sciences) demonstrating how much collaborative work is still needed to realize the benefits of shared research data. While not claiming to be an exhaustive tome, this issue offers practical suggestions and inspiration for our ongoing work together in the interest of accelerating scholarly knowledge and discovery.

Lettie Y. Conrad
North American Editor
Learned Publishing

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