Research funders and open science

In the application’s research plan under section "4.3. Open Science," the applicant is requested to submit a publication plan that considers the Council’s requirements for implementing open access to publications. The requirement for openness particularly applies to peer-reviewed articles, but other types of publications are also encouraged to be published openly.

For more details, see Research Council of Finland’s page on Open access to scientific publications and the guide Open Access Publishing.

In the application’s research plan under section "4.3. Open Science," the applicant is requested to briefly describe the key aspects of data management and sharing. The applicant should detail:

• where the data will be stored and how it will be backed up during the project.
  • Consider the tips from the University of Turku's IT department and the university’s Data Security description of University of Turku.
  • NOTE: Do not use commercial cloud services for storing personal or sensitive data. Storing data solely on USB drives or computer hard drives is not a sustainable solution. The University of Turku's IT storage services ensure automatic data backup.
  • If necessary, contact: data@utu.fi
• How potential legal and ethical issues related to data sharing (e.g., ownership, copyright, data sensitivity) will be addressed.
  • Describe how you will identify, anticipate, and manage the ethical and legal risks related to data management processes, including data protection and security.
  • Acknowledge awareness of IPR issues related to your data. It is advisable to agree on ownership, usage rights, data sharing, and authorship within the research team before the research begins. For assistance with IPR-related agreements, contact: legal@utu.fi. NOTE: Make agreements with ALL parties involved in data handling at an early stage.
  • Describe how you will share (sensitive) data, especially if you have research partners outside the University of Turku or Finland.
  • Make a clear distinction between data shared during the research and data published after the project.
  • Focus only on data sharing in this section. Other ethical aspects of the research should be presented in section 4.1.
• Where the data or its publishable part will be made available after the project ends. Data can be published either in data publications or data archives. Suitable data archives include, for example.:
  • Finnish Social Science Data Archive: receives social science, humanities, and health science data.
  • Language Bank of Finland: for language data
  • CSC - IT Center for Science's FAIRDATA services for data (IDA, AVAA) or its metadata (QVAIN)
  • CERN's Zenodo archive (University of Turku has its own community).
  • European Data Infrastructure EUDAT - storage service for all scientific fields.
  • Data archive search service: https://www.re3data.org
  • More information on storage locations can be found on the pages for long-term preservation and disposal of data or at the address openutu@utu.fi.
• If the data or part of it is not suitable for open access or reuse, or if such data will not be produced, this must be justified.

The data management plan is to be submitted after a positive funding decision. See the section "After a Positive Funding Decision" in this guide, the guide Research Data: Data management planning and the Research Council of Finland’s page on Data Management Plans.

According to the Research Council of Finland, the costs of making peer-reviewed articles openly accessible are included in the overhead costs of the host institutions. However, at the University of Turku, it is advisable to account for publication costs in the self-financing portion or otherwise within the department's budget, as the university does not have a centralized fund for publication fees. Justified layout and editing costs arising from publication activities can be included in the research project’s expenses.

The basic costs of storing and opening research data are covered by the host organization’s overhead costs. Exceptionally and for justified reasons, data opening costs can be included in the research expenses, such as when handling large datasets. Consider what resources are needed to open and preserve data according to the FAIR principles: take into account factors like working hours, equipment, the need for additional IT solutions, and any associated extra costs. Detail the data management costs in the budget according to the funder's requirements.

For more information on the costs associated with making peer-reviewed articles and research data openly accessible, please see the Research Coucil of Finland’s page Open science: open access to publications and research data.