Data Availability Statement

Reproducibility of scientific claims is integral to the integrity of published research. At the heart of research claims is the data from which results are obtained and conclusions are drawn. Without access to the original data, scientific claims can be difficult (if not impossible) to replicate. Mandatory data availability statements consolidate information on availability of data associated with the manuscript, whether data are in repositories, available on request, included with supplementary information or figure source data files.

This policy requires all Springer, Discover and Palgrave Macmillan journals to implement a research data policy which requires data availability statements. This policy does not introduce any data sharing mandates, but  aims to make the availability of the data transparent. For information whether or not this policy has yet been fully implemented by a journal, please check the journal's submission information. Please note that full implementation in all journal make take some time to achieve. 

Upon implementation of this policy, all Springer, Discover and Palgrave Macmillan journals will satisfy the requirements of Level 1 ToP (Transparency and Openness Promotion) Guidelines. Springer Nature was an early signatory in this initiative that aims to promote transparency and reproducibility in research. 

Note: We strongly recommend that authorship is anonymized in data when a journal operates double-blind peer review. A number of repositories have features to support this, providing peer review access via links that don’t include author information. These links provide private access before the data is publicly available. You can find more details on this in our repositories FAQs.