Survey of Core Facilities shows the importance of communication and management for optimal research quality

Abstract

Recently, it has become evident that academic research faces issues with the reproducibility of research data. It is critical to understand the underlying causes in order to remedy this situation. Core Facilities (CFs) have a central position in the research infrastructure and therefore they are ideally suited to promote and disseminate good research standards through their users. However, there are currently no clear guidelines directly applicable to academic CFs. To identify the most important factors for research quality, we polled 253 CFs across Europe about their practices and analysed in detail the interaction process between CFs and their users, from the first contact to the publication of the results. Although the survey showed that CFs are dedicated to train and advise their users, it highlighted the following areas, the improvement of which would directly increase research quality: 1) motivating users to follow the advice and procedures for best research practice, 2) providing clear guidance on data management practices, 3) improving communication along the whole research process and 4) clearly defining the responsibilities of each party.