PLOS ONE RESEARCH ARTICLE Search, reuse and sharing of research data in materials science and engineeringÐA qualitative interview study Bettina SuhrID*, Johanna Dungl, Alexander StockerID Virtual Vehicle Research GmbH, Graz, Austria *
[email protected] a1111111111 a1111111111 a1111111111 Abstract a1111111111 a1111111111 Open research data practices are a relatively new, thus still evolving part of scientific work, and their usage varies strongly within different scientific domains. In the literature, the inves- tigation of open research data practices covers the whole range of big empirical studies covering multiple scientific domains to smaller, in depth studies analysing a single field of OPEN ACCESS research. Despite the richness of literature on this topic, there is still a lack of knowledge on Citation: Suhr B, Dungl J, Stocker A (2020) the (open) research data awareness and practices in materials science and engineering. Search, reuse and sharing of research data in While most current studies focus only on some aspects of open research data practices, we materials science and engineeringÐA qualitative aim for a comprehensive understanding of all practices with respect to the considered scien- interview study. PLoS ONE 15(9): e0239216. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0239216 tific domain. Hence this study aims at 1) drawing the whole picture of search, reuse and sharing of research data 2) while focusing on materials science and engineering. The cho- Editor: Marco Lepidi, University of Genova, ITALY sen approach allows to explore the connections between different aspects of open research Received: February 27, 2020 data practices, e.g. between data sharing and data search. In depth interviews with 13 Accepted: September 1, 2020 researchers in this field were conducted, transcribed verbatim, coded and analysed using Published: September 15, 2020 content analysis.