As part of the NIH ​Strategic Plan for Data Science​, the NIH is committed to making datasets resulting from NIH investigator publications more accessible. Researchers sometimes find themselves with a requirement to share data, but cannot identify a specific repository to use. This situation often occurs when researchers have research datasets underlying publication figures and tables, or data not associated with a publication, they would like to share. The NIH Figshare pilot helps address this issue by providing a generalist repository option for these data.

Data submitted to NIH Figshare will be reviewed to ensure there is no personally identifiable information in the data and metadata prior to being published and made discoverable. Review will also ensure the data and metadata are findable, accessible, interoperable, and reusable – or aligned with the FAIR principles.

NIH Figshare provides NIH-funded researchers the following:

• The ability to self-publish any data type in any file format
• All data assigned a branded, citable Digital Object Identifier (DOI)
• All data associated with a license
• Ability to link grant information to published data
• Ability to embargo data
• Open access to all published data
• Data being indexed in Google and discoverable across search engines
• Usage metrics – including views, downloads, citations, and Altmetrics – tracked openly
• NIH Figshare is a one-year pilot program to test the usefulness of formally adding generalist data repositories to the NIH data ecosystem.