Services and tools

Research staff and students at Monash University have access to a wide range of services and tools for managing research data. This page gives an overview of those services and how to access them - links are provided to pages with more details about each service.

Monash University Library

Advice and planning

The Data Management Coordinator, Sam Searle, is a source of advice and support for all researchers.

Sam can refer you to all other services and will work with individuals and groups across the University to resolve other research data management issues.

Contact Sam on ext. 52080 or by email.

Some of the Library's Contact Librarians are also available to support research data management planning. You can make an appointment to talk to a librarian. In an initial interview, they will try to gain an understanding of your research and your data management needs, and will work with you to identify any problem areas. They may suggest further information, tools, services, strategies or expertise that will be useful for you.

For information about library contacts for your faculty, check the list of Contact Librarians on the Library’s website or contact the Data Management Coordinator.

Research training and professional development

In partnership with the Monash Research Graduate School (MRGS), the Library is leading the development of a 2-hour data management planning workshop. The workshop is specifically aimed at new higher degree researchers, and will be run regularly as part of MRGS' exPERT seminar programme. The Data Management Coordinator and contact librarians can work with other groups, such as staff within a school or centre, to develop a seminar or workshop that provides an overview of data management planning and Monash University services. Where a request is made for a customised event, the hosting group will be asked to contribute logistical support (room bookings, advertising the seminar to staff and students, and so on).

Monash University ARROW repository

The Monash University ARROW Repository is a place to deposit digital research data and publish it online.

Some journals and funding agencies now require supporting data to be available for scrutiny by other researchers and the wider public. Depositing data in ARROW means you can provide a permanent link to the data and your research will be more discoverable through web search providers.

Records and Archives Services

Records and Archives staff provide advice about recordkeeping requirements (e.g. retention and disposal). Research materials, particularly in print formats, that meet selection criteria and are determined to be of permanent value may be transferred to the archives collection.

Monash e-Research Centre (MeRC)

Data storage - Large Research Data Store (LaRDS)

LaRDS offers central storage for research data. This storage is permanent, secure, scalable, and backed up daily to two data centres in different physical locations.

Generous base allocations of LaRDS storage to faculties mean that in most cases there are no direct costs for researchers. Storage on LaRDS can be allocated to individuals or shared by groups of different sizes and types (e.g. project, school, centre).

There are a number of ways to upload and manage research data in LaRDS: MeRC staff can help you identify tools that best suit your needs and will process requests within 1-2 weeks.

Collaboration environments

MeRC staff can help you identify the most appropriate tools to support data sharing and other research collaboration requirements. Researchers who need to share data across institutions can consider collaboration tools such as the Sakai virtual research environment and the Confluence enterprise wiki.

Underlying storage for these collaboration tools is provided on LaRDS.

A number of national services are also emerging to support cross-institutional collaboration. MeRC staff can also advise on accessing these national services.

Digital Asset Management System - MediaFlux

Researchers with multimedia collections of research data - e.g. still and moving images, audio files - will find MediaFlux useful.

It enables researchers to easily manage digital collections, and provides attractive features like versioning and annotation (including annotation of portions of audio and video). Underlying storage is provided on LaRDS.

Other tools

MeRC can help advise on other tools for working with large datasets, scientific instruments, cross-institution collaboration, automation of data-related workflows and other complex requirements.

Send an email inquiry to the University's Data Management Coordinator.