RLA Minimum Metadata

RLA Information Model describes the types of information or data objects that RLA captures and makes them discoverable. This section provides recommendations for the minimum properties required per data object.

The following Entitiy Relationship diagram represents the minimum required properties and relationships based on the RLA Information Model.

The recommended properties are selected based on two  principles:

Principle 1: Minimise the number of properties to a maximum of five properties with the aim of simplifying the data contribution process

Principle 2: Require only properties that support either a functional requirement of RLA or identify the entity across the RLA graph/data model.

These metadata properties would satisfy the minimum requirements for the RLA functional requirements.

For Researchers, the essential properties include:

• First Name: The given name of the researcher.

• Last Name: The family or surname of the researcher

• URL: A link to the researcher's institutional webpage, providing access to their professional profile, publications, and contributions.

• ORCID: A unique identifier for academic authors and contributors.

• Scopus Author ID (Recommended): An identifier used within the Scopus database to associate researchers with their publications accurately.

For Publications, key metadata encompasses:

• Title: The publication title.

• Abstract: A brief summary of the publication's content, outlining the main arguments, results, and conclusions.

• Publication Type: For example journal article, conference paper, etc., indicating the context and intended audience of the work.

• DOI: Digital Object Identifier, providing a permanent and direct link to the publication.

• Publication Year: The year the publication was published, is important for understanding the context and currency of the research.

For Research Activities (Grants/Projects), the necessary information includes:

• Title: The name of the described research activity (e.g. title of a grant or project).

• Summary: A brief overview of the project, including goals, and expected outcomes.

• Identifier: DOI (for Grant), GrantID, RAiD (for project)

• URL: A link to more detailed information about the grant or project, providing access to a landing page, findings, or reports.

• Announcement Year: The year the grant was announced, giving context to the project's timeline and funding cycle.

• Funder: The organisation providing the financial support, indicating the source of funding and potentially the project's thematic alignment.
  

For Organisations, the metadata should cover:

• Name: The official name of the organisation.

• URL: The organisation’s website, provides a gateway to its activities, mission, and resources.

• Identifier: DOI, RoR, ABN, GRID, ISNI, Wikidata

• Country: The country where the organisation is located, is important for understanding the geographical and regulatory context.

• City: The city where the organisation is based, offering more precise localization and potential collaboration opportunities.

For Instruments, the metadata should cover:

• Title: The name of the instrument

• Identifier: DOI (or other resolvable identifiers?)

• AlternateIdentifier (Recommended): An identifier other than the primary Identifier (e.g. DOI) applied to the resource being registered. This may be any alphanumeric string which is unique within its domain of issue. 

• Description: Technical information about the instrument 

• Contributor/HostInstitution: An institution responsible for the management of the instrument 

• GeoLocation: Spatial region or named place where the data was gathered or about which the instrument is hosted.

For Patents:

• Invention title: title of the patent

• Application_number: The application number that uniquely identify the application of an IP right

• Status: The current status of the IP right or IP application

• Inventor(s) Name: Intentor(s) of the patent

• Applicant(s) Name: Applicant(s) of the patent

Relation Properties between RLA data objects

The RLA graph is a heterogeneous graph that consists of information from different sources. As such the relationship between nodes can be diverse and adopt different typologies to express the connections between nodes. For example, the relationship between researchers and projects can be classified as “contributor”, “participant”, or “investigator”. Where there is no widely accepted global taxonomy for relationship types, we recommend supporting the following:

• RIF-CS Relationships Types: https://services.ands.org.au/documentation/rifcs/vocabs/vocabularies.html#Related_Information_Type

• Crossref Relationships https://data.crossref.org/schemas/relations.xsd

• ORCID Affiliation Taxonomy: https://info.orcid.org/documentation/integration-guide/admin-guide-to-affiliations/

• ORCID Education and Employment: https://support.orcid.org/hc/en-us/articles/360006973933-Add-an-education-or-qualification-to-your-ORCID-record

Persistent Identifiers

The role of persistent identifiers is essential to support interoperability and long-term data integrity in the RLA graph/data model. Specifically, the following persistent identifiers play an important role in RLA metadata.

• PIDs for Grants and Projects: Allocating PIDs (Persistent Identifiers) to research grants and projects enables the identification and disambiguation of these entities across the RLA graph. This is particularly important when a project has participants from different universities. While there is no globally accepted PID for Grants and Projects, there are three main options for allocating PIDs to projects and grants. 

  • Firstly, both Crossref and DataCite allow the minting of DOIs (Digital Object Identifiers) for grant.

  • Secondly, a Persistent URL (PURL) can be used to transform local identifiers into Persistent URLs. 

  • Finally, RAiD (Research Activity Identifier Service) opens new opportunities to mint PIDs for research projects or activities.

• ORCID for researchers: Allocating ORCID identifiers to researchers is crucial for disambiguating individual researchers across information ingested into the RLA from various universities. Furthermore, ORCID allows the RLA to connect researchers with a wealth of information from publishers and funding bodies. As such it is highly recommended to adopt the use of ORCID for the researcher information provided to RLA. If ORCID is not available in the contributed metadata, a search provided by ORCID API and filtering the graph by related work can lead to identifying the missing ORCID identifiers.
  

• ROR or ABN for Organisations: Identifying the type, location, and domain of activity for organisations mentioned in the RLA graph is crucial for offering valuable insights into current or potential research collaborations. Internationally, http://ROR.org is a viable option for universities and research organisations, whereas the Australian Business Number (ABN) serves as a comprehensive database for companies and all registered legal entities in Australia. Combining these PIDs offers adequate support for disambiguating organisations in the RLA graph. For new records provided to RLA, it is essential to aim for mapping the organisation names to one of these PIDs.

  • Note: ROR has been omitted from the “Figure: RLA Optimum Metadata Nodes and Relationships” in favour of simplicity. At the current stage of ROR development, most Australian organisations with ROR already have a registered ABN number.
    

• DOI (or URL) for Publications and Datasets: Identifying publications and datasets with a DOI is highly recommended. However, for non-traditional research outputs where a DOI is not available, using a URL as an identifier can support disambiguation and facilitate the retrieval of complementary information from the webpage.