2025: a year of milestones and continued development

Two anniversaries

Established in 2005 by the KNAW and NWO, DANS has grown over the past two decades into the national centre of expertise for sustainable access to and reuse of research data. Today, we have more than 330,000 datasets and support a wide range of disciplines through our four Data Stations.

DataverseNL also reached a milestone: the platform turned ten. During the anniversary event, we reflected on the progress made over the past decade and on DataverseNL’s position within the broader research data management landscape.

Advancing the DANS repositories

In 2025, our Data Stations were enhanced with a variety of new functionalities. Users can now log in to all Data Stations and to DataverseNL, using their ORCID account. Several new features were introduced in Data Station Archaeology, including support for 3D data, full-text search (beyond metadata), map-based search, and automated archiving.

In addition, the deposit guidelines and file format requirements were aligned with current standards and practical experience.

European recognition for Data Station Archaeology

Data Station Archaeology was recognised in 2025 as one of four repositories meeting the Essential readiness level under European open science requirements. This classification is based on a study commissioned by the European Research Council Executive Agency (ERCEA) and conducted between September 2023 and September 2024. The assessment analysed 241 research data and literature repositories, of which 186 were classified as ‘trusted’.

The study distinguishes three readiness levels: Exemplary, Essential, and Close to Essential. Data Station Archaeology belongs to the select group awarded the Essential status, fulfilling all mandatory metadata requirements for both research data and scholarly literature.

Projects and collaborations with impact

Throughout 2025, DANS contributed to a wide-ranging portfolio of national and international projects. FAIR-IMPACT and FAIRCore4EOSC concluded with a FAIRfest, where the results of three years of collaboration were shared, including assessment tools, building blocks for the European Open Science Cloud, guidelines, and support for implementing the FAIR principles. The reviewer praised FAIR-IMPACT, led by DANS, noting that “the contribution to open science is commendable” and that “the project helps towards a stronger Europe setting international standards through the ISO Software Hash Identifier”.

In two new EOSC projects, FIDELIS and EDEN, DANS is working on themes such as digital preservation – particularly for complex research data – and improved infrastructure design for sustainable data curation and long-term accessibility. To strengthen the collective voice of trusted and FAIR-compliant repositories, we also launched a European repository network.

As National Community Development Manager for the Research Data Alliance (RDA) in 2025 and 2026, DANS – together with the National Coordination Point for RDM and NOW – supports the Dutch RDA community in exchanging knowledge on the broad array of outputs and expertise produced within the global RDA.

Within Research Data Netherlands (RDNL), we continue to reinforce national data expertise. With funding from Open Science NL, the RDNL partners have transitioned into a project consortium establishing a national training and community platform for data professionals. This year included the development of a curriculum for data professionals.

New projects also commenced, including SEFAP and Macroscope, in which DANS contributes to the development of national research infrastructures and methods for managing and making large, heterogeneous datasets findable in the domains of Aquatic Processes and, more broadly, Dutch society.

Our ongoing contributions to international initiatives continued as well, including our role on the CoreTrustSeal Board and our involvementin advancing CESSDA’s ELSST thesaurus. This fifteen-language thesaurus facilitates access to European social science data sources; the latest version includes updated demographic terminology relating to diversity and inclusion.

Finally, October saw the publication of the last issue of E-data & Research, which for almost twenty years has been a key resource for knowledge sharing within the research data community.

Looking ahead to 2026

In 2026, we will present our new strategy, in which promoting the reuse of research data – alongside training and knowledge exchange – takes centre stage. With this, we take a deliberate step from ‘reusable data’ towards the actual ‘reuse of data’, aligning with our commitment to responsible, open and sustainable research data practices. We look forward to a year in which, together with our community and partners, we explore how we can further advance data reuse.

Would you like to keep up to date with developments at DANS and in the field of data management? Sign up to receive our DataLink newsletter.