Management of research results

”la Caixa” Foundation works to promote excellence in research and innovation with a high transformative impact. The Foundation strives to disseminate the results of projects it funds and make them available as soon as possible to other researchers and the wider society. To this end it has adopted an open science policy towards the publications and data produced by the research.

Open science is a movement which aims to make scientific research, results and data accessible to everyone. In terms of scientific publications, it means seeking to open access as soon as possible; for other results, such as data, it means they must be preserved in a way that makes them findable, accessible, interoperable and reusable (FAIR Guiding Principles).

There are many reasons for sharing research publications and results: efficiency, the reuse of data for new purposes, reproducibility, the verification of results, economic efficiency, avoiding the duplication of work and data, and increased impact, visibility and transparency.

With this aim in mind, all beneficiaries of Foundation grants and scholarships are urged to share the results they obtain in the most open way and as quickly as possible, while preserving beneficiaries’ interest under the principle of “as open as possible, as closed as necessary”.

As regards scientific publications, beneficiaries should:

• File any peer-reviewed publication resulting from a funded project with an important institutional or digital repository for the discipline immediately after publishing it. The repository must state the identification code¹ for the funded project.

• Ensure that the published version of the scientific publication is accessible to the public within a period of no longer than six months counting from the date of publication.

• Verify that the version available to the public is the same as the published version. If this is not possible due to conditions imposed by the corresponding journal or platform, the author’s version will be accepted when it has passed through the peer-review process and before the final typesetting of the publication.

As regards the research data:

Beneficiaries of a ”la Caixa” Foundation grant must draw up a data management plan for all research projects it funds that have a budget of €100,000 or more. Other projects are exempt from this requirement, though they are recommended to do so as good practice.

Thus:

• The first version of the plan should be submitted within a period not exceeding six months from initiation of the project. An updated version of the plan is required when the project undergoes intermediate review, and the definitive version, together with the final report, must be presented on conclusion of the project.

• Among other aspects, the plan should refer to the data that will be generated or used, how and when they will be shared, where they will be available, how they will be preserved and, in the case of sensitive data, the nature of any processing that will be undertaken to meet applicable current legislation.

• Beneficiaries should make public, at least, the data which supports the published results together, if necessary, with any material required (software, setups, etc.) for their understanding or analysis. Such publication of data may be done in any reliable repository or archive.

• In the event of there being other project results that could be disseminated (software, setups, etc.), the beneficiaries must also make them public in an appropriate repository within a period not exceeding six months from conclusion of the project.

The content of the previous points must be carried out providing there is no impediment for reasons of privacy, personal data protection, confidentiality or in relation to protection for the purposes of commercial exploitation of the project, or in general, due to matters of intellectual or industrial property rights or other legal issues.

The full or partial application of this policy may be waived in any phase if publication or dissemination of the research data and associated material (software, setups, etc.) could harm the duly justified legitimate interests of the beneficiary (for example, for reasons of copyright, data protection and confidentiality, security, etc.).

”la Caixa” Foundation will individually study adequately justified cases that require specific treatment with respect to the application of this policy and may approve the corresponding exceptions, where applicable.

Where data cannot be made public, this must be reflected in the data management plan.²

Any possible costs associated with open access publishing of the results and data can be included in the grant awarded. Similarly, the option to pay for publication in a subscription-based journal that allows individual open access by article must always be discussed with ”la Caixa” Foundation.

This policy will come into force as from 1 June 2019.

1. See the FAQs for information on the definition of the project identification code.
2. See Ethics and data protection by the European Commission.