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About SCARP

The purpose of our recent SCARP project was to investigate the diverse attitudes and approaches to data deposit, sharing and reuse, curation and preservation across disciplines. We hope that our findings will help to encourage further knowledge sharing and promote good practice in digital curation activities throughout all areas.

We used a range of methods to conduct our SCARP research. By combining traditional survey/literature review approaches with seven immersive case studies in selected research communities, we have improved our understanding of the specific issues affecting curation and preservation and highlighted possible ways forward.

Digital curation across disciplines
At the DCC, we believe that digital curation is about much more than data preservation. We also want research teams from across the UK and beyond to benefit from pooling research data and sharing knowledge. 

Yet approaches to digital curation vary widely across disciplines. Below are just some of the areas of difference that became apparent to us in the course of our work on SCARP:

  Deposit arrangements and requirements

  Linkage of data to publications

  Preservation arrangements

  Data and information reuse

  Observational versus experimental data

  Organisational and institutional structures

  Research process and methods

  Levels of workforce skills

Our SCARP findings are vital in helping us to increase our understanding of these differences in digital curation approaches, so that we might address them for the benefit of the wider research community as a whole. Only by creating some common standards and consistencies will digital curation be successful on a large scale. 

The DCC is funded by

Joint Information Systems Committee