Resurfacing Historical Scientific Data: A Case Study Involving Fruit Breeding Data

Abstract

The objective of this paper is to illustrate the importance and complexities of working with historical analog data that exists on university campuses. Using a case study of fruit breeding data, we highlight issues and opportunities for librarians to help preserve and increase access to potentially valuable data sets. Methods: We worked in conjunction with researchers to inventory, describe, and increase access to a large, 100-year-old data set of analog fruit breeding data. This involved creating a spreadsheet to capture metadata about each data set, identifying data sets at risk for loss, and digitizing select items for deposit in our institutional repository. Results/Discussion: We illustrate that large amounts of data exist within biological and agricultural sciences departments and labs, and how past practices of data collection, record keeping, storage, and management have hindered data reuse. We demonstrate that librarians have a role in collaborating with researchers and providing direction in how to preserve analog data and make it available for reuse. This work may provide guidance for other science librarians pursuing similar projects. Conclusions: This case study demonstrates how science librarians can build or strengthen their role in managing and providing access to analog data by combining their data management skills with researchers' needs to recover and reuse data.

Historical Scientific Analog Data: Life Sciences Faculty’s Perspectives on Management, Reuse and Preservation

“…Although digitization is seen as a way to preserve analog datasets and increase their accessibility, scanning old data is known to be both time and resource intensive (Bosilovich et al 2013;Farrell et al 2019). Yet, more than 40% of our survey respondents have done some scanning, illustrating their commitment to preserving the data.…”

“…Some of the data may be able to be ingested into data repositories, some may be able to be scanned and placed into digital repositories, some could possibly be added to archives in its analog format, and other analog datasets may be able to be indexed and identified via a registry. A case study that investigated how to organize, preserve, and make a historical fruit breeding analog dataset discoverable implemented a variety of these strategies (Farrell et al 2019). For other data sets, a different combination of methods might be more appropriate.…”

“…Therefore, we should be working to help them develop storage and preservation plans and the means to share their research data. The work that we did with horticultural researchers regarding their historical fruit breeding data serves as an example of one approach that could be taken and the impact it can have (Farrell et al 2019).…”

Consolidating 23 years of historical data from an irrigated subtropical rice breeding program in Uruguay

“…Genomic data generated for selected germplasm since 2013 (Monteverde et al., 2018; Rosas et al., 2018) have also been stored separately from phenotypic records. This scattering and disconnection of IRBP data poses potential risk of data loss, underuse (Farrell et al., 2019), and mismatches that may negatively impact on selection accuracy and program efficiency (Rutkoski, 2019). A crucial step for a proper data management system is the consolidation of a unified database combining phenotypic information from multiple trials, years, and locations with genomic and pedigree records (Odell et al., 2017), and store the data in a centralized location.…”

A Critical Literature Review of Historic Scientific Analog Data: Uses, Successes, and Challenges

“…Our interest in this topic began when a few senior faculty members approached the University library for assistance in organizing and possibly housing their analog data (Farrell et al 2019). A survey of life sciences researchers on campus revealed that many held analog data and considered it valuable but were unsure of how to preserve it (Farrell et al 2020).…”