There have been many queries that I've tried to answer about data
ownership.  I suspect the topic has finally caught the attention of
university administrators because of calls being made from OIG at NSF.

For those of you who have attended my workshop on Ownership and
Retention of Data this spring, you'll recall that I stressed that in
my opinion we should get away from who owns the data, and instead
talk about who controls, who retains, who can access, what happens
when faculty leave, etc.  The feds never talk about ownership
of federally funded research results, and even the mere
mention that universities own data raises the roof with most faculty.

Feds really want to know how universities are ensuring data will be
retained (and remember, fed regulation says only 3 years after
submission of final expenditure report) and how they can access it,
e.g., when a faculty departs and wants to take original (and this is
key word, original (raw) data with him.  And recall, all data cannot
be accurately reproduced (e.g., Western blots, autoradiograms, etc.),
so faculty usually need to take to continue research. Of course for
original data recorded in notebooks, it is easy, but time consuming,
to just have faculty copy and take.

As I discuss in workshop have a policy that covers transfer of data.
For example, use a Transfer Agreement and make the data transferred
responsibility of PI but subject to terms and conditions, e.g., how
long it has to be retained for access by university, conditions under
which data can be destroyed, etc.

A reminder, here we are talking about all data, not just data used
for patents/copyrights, etc. At the workshop I emphasized that all
data for patents must be retained by university because of possible
interferences and infringements.

The workshop on Ownership and Retention of Data (very greatly changed
since last Nov.) will be given again at NCURA National this November.
I hope some of you will consider attending.

Call if you need more information.

404-727-2503 Ann Stevens
Ann R. Stevens,Ph.D.
Phone 404-727-2503
Fax 404-727-2509
xxxxxx@OSP.EMORY.EDU
Emory University