Participate Today in Digital Materials Data Survey

Gaining insights as to how the international materials community views and currently handles key issues related to the generation, sharing, and long-term management of digital research data is the purpose of an online survey that was jointly developed by volunteers from TMS and the Materials Research Society (MRS). The survey can be accessed at the link at the end of this article. The broad international materials science and engineering community is encouraged to participate. The survey will be open through May 31, 2013.

Topics specifically being explored by the survey are:

Big Data: The management of very large sets of data. For the materials community, “Big Data” could be crucial for accelerating materials discovery and the path to applications and commercialization.

Open Data: Providing public access to data, especially federally funded research.

The results of the survey will be used to inform professional society dialogue, planning, and activities, and will also be provided to the U.S. President’s Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP) in support of the Materials Genome Initiative.

“While MRS and TMS serve distinct and unique membership interests, there are still many areas where we can pool our strengths to benefit the greater good of the materials science and engineering community,” said James J. Robinson, TMS Executive Director. “This project is an excellent example of how intersecting interests in the association community can be effectively served—and the overall good of our field advanced—by collaboration.”