KU Leuven started on the road to FAIR in 2018 with the creation of a general institutional RDM policy based on the FAIR principles and the motto “as open as possible, as closed as necessary”, accompanied by the decision to set up institutional tools to enable the implementation of the policy. This includes the development and launch of the Dataverse-based institutional data repository, RDR, and the local iRODS instance, ManGO, which supports data management in a structured and metadata-rich way during the research project.

To fully enable FAIR data management, it was important to facilitate interoperability of data by connecting these infrastructures with each other and other RDM tools. In this context, a Dataverse plug-in was developed by the RDR team to easily pull data from other RDM tools and for ManGO, a connection was set up to push data to RDR as well. This ensures that researchers who use ManGO or RDR have a seamless experience in moving data from ManGO to RDR that are ready for publication. All work is shared in open-source where possible to make sure that not only KU Leuven data, but also RDM infrastructure is as open as possible.

Researchers are increasingly generating larger datasets thanks to improved technologies and methods, which can present a challenge for data repositories that need to scale their infrastructure and services to support publication of these datasets. The Texas Data Repository (TDR) has been working for several years on enhancing its multi-institutional service model, technical infrastructure, and data retention policy in order to better accommodate publishing of large research datasets. The TDR Steering Committee has recently approved recommendations produced by its Large Data group which will result in new work to scale support for large datasets while preserving flexibility for individual TDR member institutions. This presentation will share these recommendations, progress that has been made thus far, and our strategy for collaborating with the open source Dataverse community on codebase contributions that can also benefit other data repositories.

Latin America faces unique obstacles in increasing equal access to research outputs and repositories due to variations in infrastructure, resources, and awareness. This presentation summarizes the results of a detailed Landscape Analysis undertaken in the region, which identified important gaps and possibilities for promoting repository development and interoperability. This analysis provides concrete recommendations for closing these gaps through collaboration, capacity building, and the implementation of metadata standards. Attendees will get a better awareness of the regional context, practical solutions to difficulties, and scalable ways for global repository networks.

Texas A&M University has had a standard administrative procedure in place for many years to ensure that publicly funded research is made available for the public good and is preserved for appropriate amounts of time. However, research practices have not always guaranteed retention or availability, and TAMU had cause to improve the accounting for research data output. In 2023, TAMU’s Vice President for Research began an initiative to address this state of affairs. The VPR started discussions with Libraries and Technology Services to develop a catalog to track grant-funded research data and increase its discoverability and impact. Such data include datasets in repositories, data housed on departmental or cloud services, and physical research artifacts in storage. To fulfill these aims, Libraries directed the development of a customized DSpace instance, leveraging the new Entities feature introduced in DSpace 7 to meet the required use-cases of the platform. With the Data@TAMU catalog now in production, the collaborating stakeholders each fulfill vital roles. The Libraries collaborate with researchers to manage and catalog data outputs, Technology Services provides development and networking services, and the VPR’s office ensures deans and faculty responsibly manage data to achieve compliance.