Emerging Data Curation Roles for Librarians: A Case Study of Agricultural Data

Abstract

This article discusses ways in which agricultural librarians can transform what they do to meet the emerging needs of scientists for creating data management strategies. Discussion of the Purdue University Libraries’ experience with evolving roles in working with scientists will include required knowledge, training, experimentation, and development of working relationships with scientists involved in the data curation, as well as pitfalls and barriers.

KEYTERMS:

• data curation
• data management
• faculty partnerships
• librarian roles

Notes

The National Science Board's 2005 report, Long-Lived Digital Data Collections: Enabling Research and Education in the 21st Century, defines data as “any information that can be stored in digital form” and data collection as “not only the stored data but also the infrastructure, organization, and individuals necessary to preserve access to the data.”