NIH Invites Your Comments on its Draft Plan for Data Science

The US National Institutes of Health (NIH) invites psychological scientists, other researchers, and the general public to comment a draft Strategic Plan for Data Science aiming to set priorities for data science in the years ahead.

NIH’s draft Strategic Plan for Data Science, which you can read by clicking on this link, identifies current challenges in the area of data science, sets an agenda for implementing the plan, and identifies central themes and broad goals. For instance, a core component of the draft plan states that NIH’s data science efforts should commit to the “FAIR” principles—which mean that data should be Findable, Accessible, Interoperable, and Reusable. The strategic plan outlines five overarching goals.  These include:

• Supporting a highly efficient and effective biomedical research data infrastructure
• Promoting modernization of the data-resources ecosystem
• Supporting the development and dissemination of advanced data management, analytics, and visualization tools
• Enhancing workforce development for biomedical data science
• Enacting appropriate policies to promote stewardship and sustainability

“Data science is an integral component of modern biomedical research. It is the interdisciplinary field of inquiry in which quantitative and analytical approaches, processes, and systems are developed and used to extract knowledge and insights from increasingly large and/or complex sets of data. Data science has increased in importance for biomedical research over the past decade and NIH expects that trend to continue,” reads NIH’s notice introducing the comment period.

Scientists who wish to comment on the draft Strategic Plan for Data Science should follow the instructions in the NIH notice by submitting their responses electronically by clicking on this link. Responses can include feedback on the plan, opportunities for NIH to partner in achieving its goals, and more.

Responses must be submitted by April 2, 2018.