On this page you will find information about data management requirements and expectations from UK Research and Innovation (UKRI) Councils.
You can also check for data management and open access policy requirements of all funders through the Sherpa Services database.
We can provide guidance to University of Bath staff on writing your Data Management Plan and are happy to review your Data Management Plan before grant submission. Please contact the Research Data Service for more information.
Individual researchers should consult the documentation of their individual grant to receive specific guidance on the expectations relating to research data for their project. However, each research council that is part of UKRI holds certain principles in common relating to the management of research data that include, but are not limited to the following:
These principles are explored in greater detail within the policies listed below.
The Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC) supports the UKRI's position on open research that states that funded research should be made as "open as possible and as closed as necessary".
There is not a general AHRC data management plan.
Researchers should check the individual provisions of their grant.
In accordance with the UKRI guidance on making your research article open access, it is expected that you will include a data access statement in the accompanying research publication. Guidance on writing data access statements is available in our 'Archiving and sharing data' guide.
Data is expected to be retained at the end of the project for at least 3 years. For the specific retention period, please see the individual requirements for the grant.
The Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council (BBSRC) supports the UKRI's position on open research that states that funded research should be made as "open as possible and as closed as necessary".
The BBSRC requires submission of a Data Management Plan as part of grant applications. They provide guidance on the contents of the Data Management Plan in their what to include in your application.
The BBSRC recognises that data sharing has time and cost implications. Funding to support the management and sharing of research data (e.g. staffing, physical resources such as storage and networking capability) can be requested as part of the full economic cost of the project.
In accordance with the UKRI guidance on making your research article open access, it is expected that you will include a data access statement in the accompanying research publication. Guidance on writing data access statements is available in our 'Archiving and sharing data' guide.
Whilst the BBSRC recognises that researchers have a legitimate interest in benefiting from their data, this does not allow for prolonged periods of exclusive use. The BBSRC expects that release of data should be 'generally no later than the release through publication of the main findings and should be in-line with established best practice in the field'. Where best practice does not exist 'release within three years of generation is suggested as a guide'. Importantly, the BBSRC states that commercialisation of research 'does not preclude data sharing and should not unduly prevent or delay data sharing'.
In accordance with the BBSRC data sharing policy it expects that data are 'maintained for a period of 10 years after completion of the research project in suitable accessible formats using established standards where possible such that the data can be made available on request'.
The EPSRC supports the view that 'publicly funded research data should generally be made as widely and freely available as possible in a timely and responsible manner' and that 'research process should not be damaged by the inappropriate release of data'. The EPSRC's policy framework applies to all EPSRC funded projects and includes digital and non-digital data and software. For compliance, it monitors the availability of data supporting published findings.
The EPSRC does not require a Data Management Plan to be submitted at time of grant application. It does, however recommend that you write a Data Management Plan for your own benefit when submitting an application so that you can accurately budget the time and resources you will need for data management during the project. This is especially important if your needs might exceed the storage that the University currently provides as standard.
Note that the University of Bath Research Data Policy requires that all research projects have a Data Management Plan and, as such, all funded EPRSC projects are required to have a Data Management Plan, but this plan does not need to be submitted to the EPSRC. Data Management Plan templates that can be used for EPSRC projects are:
The EPSRC allows grant proposals to include research data management costs in their budget.
All publications arising from EPSRC funded work must contain a data access statement.
The EPSRC expects all research data (including software and other code) supporting published findings to be made as freely and openly as possible in a timely manner (within 12 months), recognising that there may be legal, ethical or commercial reasons why access may be restricted.
Data must be securely preserved for a minimum of 10 years from that date that any researcher 'privileged access' period expires, or if others have accessed the data, from the last date on which access to the data was requested by a third party.
The Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) supports the UKRI's position on open research that states that funded research should be made as "open as possible and as closed as necessary".
ESRC applicants, other than those applying for studentship funding, who plan to generate data from their research must submit a Data Management and Sharing Plan as part of their application. The ESRC does not supply a formal template, but the topics that the plan should cover are summarised in ESRC data management plan and policy and in their Research Data Policy under 'Responsibilities for ESRC grant holders'.
The ESRC will provide appropriate funding for data management where the costs of implementation have been included in the Data Management Plan. However, this cannot include costs for data archiving as the ESRC already funds the UK Data Service.
Principle 3 of the ESRC's Research Data Policy states that 'published results shall always include information on how to access the supporting data and / or the associated metadata'. There is guidance on writing data access statements in our 'Archiving and sharing data' guide.
Any data created or repurposed during an ESRC-funded project must be offered to the UK Data Service, or the grantee's institutional repository within three months of the end of the grant.
The Medical Research Council (MRC) expects data to be shared with the scientific community in order 'to maximise the value of the data for research and eventual public benefit'. This should be done 'with as few restrictions as possible' and 'in a timely and responsible manner'.
The MRC requires that all applicants submitting funding proposals submit a Data Management Plan. The NRC provide guidance on this topic, as well as a Data Management Plan template (Word document).
The Data Management plan should be written using their template, although it cannot be uploaded to the TFS and instead must be copied in.
The length of the plan will vary depending on the type of study; it is advised that researchers check their grant documentation for the specifics on this matter. Generally speaking, the length is 1500 words for longitudinal studies, as well as population cohorts, genetic, omics and imaging data, as well as biobanks. For other forms of research, the length varies between 500 to 1500 words.
The MRC will provide resources and funding for managing and sharing substantial data resources / collections. This could be for people, equipment, infrastructure and tools to manage, store, analyse and provide access to data. Where the costs of managing and sharing data are substantial, funding proposals should differentiate between the costs of:
All publications arising from MRC funded projects should be accompanied by a data access statement. Guidance on writing data access statements is available in our 'Archiving and sharing data' guide.
The MRC expects data to be shared 'with as few restrictions as possible' and 'in a timely and responsible manner', with consideration to ethics and regulations.
The MRC allows a limited, defined period of exclusive use of data for primary research. Publication of data can be delayed for a short period to allow for patent applications to be drafted.
Data must be retained for a minimum of 10 years. For population health and clinical studies this retention period is extended to 20 years.
The Natural Environment Research Council (NERC) supports the UKRI's position on open research that states that funded research should be made as "open as possible and as closed as necessary" and considers the environmental data produced by the activities it funds as a public good.
All applications for NERC funding must include a one-page outline Data Management Plan. The aim of this plan is only to identify if the project will produce data and the likely quantity of data, if known. NERC provide a template for the outline Data Management Plan.
If funding is successful the outline Data Management Plan will be shared with the relevant NERC data centre, who will work with PIs to prepare a detailed data management plan within three to six months of the start of the grant. NERC provide a full Data Management Plan template.
DMPOnline has templates for the outline and full NERC Data Management Plans. Guidance on using DMPOnline is available from our DMPOnline guidance page.
Applications for NERC funding must identify all resources needed to implement the Data Management Plan. The relevant NERC data centre can provide advice relating to additional specialist data management costs that may need to be included in the grant proposal.
The NERC Data Policy explicitly requires that all research publications arising from NERC funding must include a statement on how the supporting data and any other relevant research materials can be accessed. Guidance on writing data access statements is available in our 'Archiving and sharing data' guide.
The NERC requires that all environmental data of long-term value generated through NERC-funded activities must be submitted to an appropriate NERC data centre for long-term preservation and dissemination.
NERC will normally allow researchers a maximum of two years from the end of data collection to work exclusively on, and publish the results of, data they have collected.
NERC typically expect finalised data to be submitted to a NERC data centre as soon after the end of data collection as possible. NERC define the end of data collection and the start of the embargo periods as 'the point at which the data becomes available from an instrument or experiment' not the end of the project.
NERC expects that all data and research materials that underpin research publications should be preserved and accessible for a minimum of 10 years after completion of the research.
The Science and Technology Facilities Council (STFC) aims to ensure that scientific data produced as its facilities are carefully managed and optimally exploited, both in the short and long-term.
SFTC's Scientific Data Policy does not apply to software as a form of data in its own right, nor to collections of physical items. It defines data as:
Data Management Plans are expected for all STFC-funded projects that generate data that falls within the scope of the STFC scientific data policy. If a Data Management Plan is not needed, this should be explained in an attachment.
STFC does not provide a Data Management Plan template, but does specify that it should not exceed two pages of A4. It lists a series of topics that it would normally expect a plan to cover, and directs applicants to the guidance on Data Management Plans provided by the Digital Curation Centre.
A template for an suggested STFC Data Management Plan is available from DMPOnline. Guidance on using DMPOnline is available from our DMPOnline guidance page.
STFC will consider costs associated with the Data Management Plan as part of the grant review process.
STFC expects applicants to make use of their existing data management skills where possible, but will consider funding additional specialist staff or training to enable effective management, preservation, and sharing of data, provided that sufficient justification can be made. Justified requests can also be made for resources to cover any computational facilities needed to manage, store and share the data generated by the research.
All publications arising from STFC funded projects should be accompanied by a data access statement. Guidance on writing data access statements is available in our 'Archiving and sharing data' guide.
STFC expects published data, displayed or otherwise, referred to in a publication, to be made publicly available to anyone within six months of the date of the relevant publication (unless there is legislative, ethical, privacy or security reasons to prevent this). Limited periods of exclusive use of the data are permitted to enable a first opportunity to exploit the results of research, including intellectual property.
STFC expects data to be managed through an established repository, chosen to maximise the scientific value from aggregation of related data. They recognise situations where registrations for access to data may be appropriate. Where possible, STFC expects that the original data, from which other related data can be in principle derived, are retained for a minimum of 10 years from the end of the project. Data that cannot be re-measured should be retained indefinitely.