How to Share Data (an Overview)

If you would like to submit data to the NF Data Portal, steps to do so are outlined below. Please note that if your project has been funded by one of our partners, you may have additional data sharing obligations outlined in your agreement with the funder.

Please ensure that you have the appropriate permission and authority to share data from this study (such as Institutional Review Board approval, informed consent, etc.). If you need to place conditions for use (access restrictions) on your data, please let us know (and be sure to detail them in your data sharing plan).

Sharing data involves the following actions, to be completed in order:

1. Become a Registered and Certified User: Start by registering on Synapse and completing the certification quiz. Certification is required to upload data.

   • Registered Users: As a registered user, you can create projects and wikis. Collaboration with other registered users and the formation of Synapse teams are also possible. Additionally, registered users can download publicly available data. Subject to meeting project-specific Conditions for Use, they may access controlled data.

   • Certified Users: Once certified, you gain full access to Synapse features, enabling you to upload files and tables and create folders.

     • Certification Process: To become certified, you need to take a short quiz covering the Synapse Commons Data Use Procedure. This quiz ensures your understanding of the rules and policies governing data sharing on Synapse. It consists of 15 questions and typically takes around 15-20 minutes to complete.

2. Complete a data sharing plan (DSP): The goal of this is to support the FAIR principles (Findable, Accessible, Interoperable, and Reusable) and allows you to describe the data being shared and how/when they will be released. You can access the DSP here. Your project will be set up by us after we receive your data sharing plan.

3. Add team members to your project: To share the project with others on your research team, you can create a Team on Synapse. Find more information and instructions to do so here. Once your Team is created, it will appear in your Synapse profile here. Once you have created a team, you can add the team to your project from the main project page, giving them access. To do so, go to Project Settings > Project Sharing Settings.

4. Upload your data: Once your project is created in Synapse and you’ve added some folders to house your data, you’re ready to upload your project’s data. We have a separate page on this site with instructions to do so, which you can find in our How to Upload Data document.

5. Annotate your data: This involves labeling your files with metadata so users can easily find and filter for the data they need when exploring data on the portal. We have a separate page on this site with more information and instructions on adding annotations, which you can find in our How to Annotate Data document.

6. Review your project: Once your data are ready for public release, you’ll want to review your project to make sure it’s good to go! Most importantly, make sure you have the appropriate permission and authority to share the data. Additionally, check that your data are properly annotated with metadata and that all associated details are correct.

Once all data is deposited and the embargo period ends, we’ll share your data on the NF Data Portal!