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CASRAI

CASRAI / Open research vocabularies

A shared language
for research.

Clear definitions. Visible contributions. Connected knowledge.

Open vocabularies and practical guidance for the people who conduct, support, and communicate research.

Explore the Dictionary Our purpose
Openly licensed / Built for reuse / Founded in 2006

Universities & research organisations

Referenced across the research world

The CRediT taxonomy — now ANSI/NISO Z39.104-2022, stewarded by NISO — is referenced in guidance published by these research institutions and infrastructure organisations. The pages below link to each institution’s own guidance.

Explore the original guidance on each institution’s own website.CRediT adoption worldwide →

01 / The reference library

Three resources. A common purpose.

Precise language that helps research travel across people, disciplines, and systems.

Standards & releases

CRediT is stewarded by NISO. NIKOLAI crosswalks are CASRAI’s interpretations, not endorsements by the organisations described.

Inside the Dictionary

A place for every
research concept.

Browse 29 domains across 6 connected tracks.

View the domain map
AContribution & attribution
BIdentifiers & infrastructure
CData, methods & reproducibility
DCompliance, integrity & security
EAssessment, equity & sustainability
FResearch disciplines

From the Dictionary

Browse all entries

Responsible research assessment

IEEE Transactions on Dependable and Secure Computing

IEEE Transactions on Dependable and Secure Computing (TDSC) is a bimonthly peer-reviewed journal published by the IEEE Computer Society focusing on architectural, software, and protocol-level security and fault tolerance. In academic…

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Responsible research assessment

IEEE Transactions on Information Forensics and Security

IEEE Transactions on Information Forensics and Security (TIFS) is a peer-reviewed academic journal published by the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) covering information security, digital forensics, biometrics,…

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Responsible research assessment

Computers & Security: Journal Metrics & Impact

Computers & Security (ISSN 0167-4048, E-ISSN 1872-6208) is a peer-reviewed academic journal published by Elsevier covering information assurance and cybersecurity. Journal metrics include an OpenAlex-verified 2-year mean citedness of 11.90…

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Responsible research assessment

ACM Transactions on Privacy and Security (TOPS)

ACM Transactions on Privacy and Security (TOPS) is a peer-reviewed academic journal published by the Association for Computing Machinery that covers research in information security, cryptography, systems privacy, and data protection.…

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Responsible research assessment

Medical & Biological Engineering & Computing

Medical & Biological Engineering & Computing (MBEC) is an international peer-reviewed journal covering biomedical engineering, medical computing, and clinical instrumentation. Founded in 1963, it is the official journal of the International…

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Responsible research assessment

Frontiers in Microbiology Impact Factor

The Frontiers in Microbiology impact factor is the Journal Impact Factor associated with that journal: citations in a given JCR year to items published in the previous two years, divided by the citable items from those two years. The…

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A closer look / Shared vocabularies

Make the work behind the work visible.

Named contributions, clear definitions, and traceable sources.

CRediT / Contributor Roles Taxonomy

Fourteen ways to contribute.

CRediT describes contributions to scholarly research outputs. Originated in 2012, it was stewarded by CASRAI from 2014 until its transfer to NISO in 2020 and formalised as ANSI/NISO Z39.104-2022.

Explore all 14 roles Build a contributor statement
ConceptualizationMethodologySoftwareValidationFormal analysisInvestigationResourcesData curationWriting — original draftWriting — review & editingVisualizationSupervisionProject administrationFunding acquisitionANSI/NISO Z39.104CRediT14 roles
Every contribution has a name. A contributor may hold more than one role.

NIKOLAI / Frontier AI safety

The same discipline, in a new field.

Nomenclature & Index for Knowledge Ontologies, Lexicons & AI Interoperability

CASRAI’s dictionary for frontier AI safety governance uses named elements, stable URIs, and crosswalks to published primary documents. Every mapping is CASRAI’s own reading, with its source and limitations made explicit.

Tracks N1–N9 connect vocabulary from frameworks and statutes published by Anthropic, OpenAI, Google DeepMind, xAI, Meta, the EU, California, and others. N10, Assurance roles, describes NIKOLAI’s own mapping-declaration governance, structurally modelled on CRediT.

Explore NIKOLAI Read the changelog

The NIKOLAI track index

10 tracks
  1. N1Actors, models and scope
  2. N2Threat models and risk framing
  3. N3Thresholds and checkpoints
  4. N4Claims and argument
  5. N5Evidence and evaluations
  6. N6Mitigations and security
  7. N7Incidents
  8. N8Transparency and review
  9. N9Commitments and governance
  10. N10Assurance roles

Independent CASRAI mappings; no endorsement by the organisations described.

02 / Put knowledge to work

Find your starting point.

The same shared language, with guidance shaped around your work.

01

For researchers & authors

Describe contributions, prepare a CRediT statement, and connect your research identity.

Explore guidance 02

For research institutions

Bring shared definitions into research offices, information systems, and institutional policy.

Explore guidance 03

For scholarly publishers

Use contributor roles in submissions, editorial workflows, and structured publishing metadata.

Explore guidance 04

For developers & integrators

Work with stable identifiers, open downloads, APIs, and implementation documentation.

Explore guidance

03 / Research guidance

Follow the subject, wherever it leads.

Definitions, practical guides, and implementation advice across the research lifecycle.

All research guides
Start with the overviewResearch administration
01

CRediT & Authorship Attribution

Contributor roles, authorship criteria and order, integrity and disputes.

02

Research Data Management

DMPs, repositories, FAIR data, metadata standards, and reproducibility.

03

Persistent Identifiers & CRIS

ORCID, DOI, ROR, research-information systems, and bibliometrics.

04

Research Integrity & Compliance

Misconduct oversight, research security, export control, and ethics.

05

Scholarly Publishing

Open access, transformative agreements, research assessment, and metadata.

06

Scholarly Writing

Manuscript conventions, proposal craft, and reviewer-response writing.

07

Grants Management & Funding

The funding lifecycle, agencies and foundations, and award compliance.

08

Technology Transfer & Innovation

University IP, licensing mechanics, spinouts, and startup formation.

09

Clinical Research Administration

Trial operations, regulatory pathways, and billing compliance.

10

Laboratory Operations & Safety

Protocols and SOPs, equipment operation, and chemical, biological and physical hazard safety.

11

Research Methods & Statistics

Study design, sampling and power, quantitative and qualitative analysis, and survey research.

12

Research Tools & Software

Reference managers, statistical and qualitative software, survey platforms, and lab informatics.

13

Laboratory Compliance & Quality

GxP, 21 CFR Part 11, ISO 17025 and CLIA accreditation, biosafety, and chemical hygiene.

14

Laboratory Equipment & Instruments

Selecting, calibrating and maintaining pipettes, autoclaves, balances, centrifuges and more.

15

Patient Safety & Infection Prevention

HAI surveillance, sentinel event review, stewardship, and reprocessing standards.

16

Frontier AI Safety & Governance

Frontier AI safety frameworks, regulation, third-party evaluation, and incident governance.

Another way to explore

Browse by discipline & industry

All disciplines
Life & Health Sciences14
Physical Sciences & Engineering12
Computing & Data5
Social Sciences & Humanities14
Agriculture & Environment4
Industry & Applied R&D14
Most-read research guides

Popular across the research community

Selected guides from across CASRAI’s research topics.

Connected research / From terms to systems

A vocabulary is a beginning.

Identifiers connect the people, institutions, projects, and outputs behind research. Shared standards help those connections travel.

The persistent identifier ecosystem

A research record is more useful when its parts can be identified consistently across systems.

ORCID
The researcher
ROR
The research organisation
RAiD
The project or research activity · ISO 23527:2022
DOI
The research output · Crossref, DataCite, and other agencies
IGSN / PIDINST
Samples and research instruments
The PID stack for researchers Compare ORCID, ROR, and RAiD
PERSONORCID0000-0002-…ORGANISATIONRORror.org/…PROJECTRAiDISO 23527OUTPUTDOI10.xxxx/…SAMPLE / INSTR.IGSN / PIDINSTDataCite-stewardedResearchartefact
A connected research record, from the contributor to the output.
FOUNDATION · LAYER 1CASRAI Dictionary1,986 entries · 29 domains · 6 tracks · CC-BY 4.0A · B · C · D · E · FHUBS · LAYER 2Audience hubsAuthors · Institutions · Publishers · ImplementersEDITORIAL · LAYER 3News · PerspectivesWorking-group reports & commentary

How this site is organised

Dictionary. Guidance. Conversation.

The Dictionary provides the canonical foundation: 1,986 entries across 29 domains. Audience hubs translate definitions into practical guidance. News, perspectives, and working-group reports carry the conversation.

NISOCRediT stewardeuroCRISCERIF interopCODATARDM terminologyRDAResearch dataORCIDPerson PIDCrossrefOutput DOIsDataCiteData DOIsARDCRAiD registryCASRAIEST. 2006

Standards relationships

Built to work alongside others.

CASRAI crosswalks and incubates vocabulary alongside standards stewarded by NISO, euroCRIS, CODATA, RDA, ORCID, Crossref, DataCite, and ARDC. Explore the standards and releases catalogue, standards relationships, and regional adoption hubs.

04 / From reference to practice

Useful tools for everyday research.

Move from understanding a standard to using it.

Explore all tools

CRediT statement builder

Assign roles to contributors and export a publication-ready statement.

Open tool

AI disclosure helper

Prepare a disclosure with guidance for your target publisher.

Open tool

Citation generator

Turn a CASRAI reference into a citation in your preferred format.

Open tool

Ask CASRAI / Regulatory Radar

A research question deserves a sourced answer.

Ask about 2 CFR 200 cost allowability, Federal Register notices, or funder-specific requirements, and follow the cited passages behind the answer. Regulatory Radar checks daily for OMB amendments to the Uniform Guidance.

2 free questions, no account needed. Subscribers get a higher-tier model and up to 10 source passages per answer for $29/month; cancel from your account.

See what it can answer
Ask 2 questions free

05 / Perspectives & developments

The conversation around research.

News & perspectives

Featured essay / 2026

State of CRediT
adoption.

Where contributor recognition stands—and what meaningful implementation requires.

Read the essay

Open by design

Knowledge is more useful
when it can be shared.

Reference a definition, download the vocabulary, or connect it to the systems you already use. CASRAI Dictionary content is available under CC BY 4.0.

Download the Dictionary Implementation guide
01

Reference with confidence

Stable entry URLs and structured definitions.

02

Choose your format

JSON-LD, JSON, CSV, XLSX, OWL, RDF Turtle, and BibTeX.

03

Build on open foundations

GraphQL / REST API / MCP

Cite the resource you use.Read the licence

06 / Our community

Shared language is
a collective effort.

Explore CASRAI’s working groups, contribute your expertise, or create your author profile in the Verified Contributor Directory.

Explore working groups Become a member

Explore the standards and infrastructure our work connects with

In practice / Healthcare publishing

Contributor recognition beyond journals.

CRediT’s attribution pattern also helps expert publishers explain who created, reviewed, and validated their reference content.

See the implementation at LAC Health

Our history / Since 2006

Twenty years of shared language.

Read the full history
  1. 2006

    CASRAI founded

    A shared vocabulary for research-administration information.

  2. 2014

    CRediT 1.0

    The first 14-role taxonomy publication.

  3. 2016

    Publisher metadata adoption

    CRediT begins to travel through publishing infrastructure.

  4. 2018

    Structured publishing

    Contributor roles become part of XML publishing workflows.

  5. 2020

    A transfer of stewardship

    CRediT transfers from CASRAI to NISO.

  6. 2022

    Formal standards

    ANSI/NISO Z39.104-2022 for CRediT; ISO 23527:2022 for RAiD.

  7. 2024

    Standards relationships

    Crosswalks connect research vocabularies and infrastructure.

  8. 2026

    Dictionary v2026.1

    1,986 entries across 29 domains, openly available for reuse.

“A common vocabulary is the difference between a federated research-information ecosystem and twelve walled gardens that almost-but-not-quite agree. The CASRAI Dictionary is what we point at when we mean the same thing.”
CASRAI Editorial Board / Preface to Dictionary v2026.1

Verified Contributor Directory

Your work, connected to your identity.

Create a public, ORCID-verified author profile with your contributor roles and journals, editorially reviewed. Membership is free.

Stay connected

Take part in what comes next.

Release updates, public-comment windows, and opportunities to contribute.

CASRAI

One email a month · The CASRAI Bulletin

The CASRAI Bulletin

A six-minute editorial digest of what actually changed in research-administration standards — and what is about to.

  • Public-comment windows on release candidates — hard deadlines, easy to miss anywhere else.
  • The dictionary changelog: new, revised, deprecated and renamed entries, each with a permalink.
  • One perspective essay from a working-group chair, plus what NISO, euroCRIS and CODATA published.

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Standards and formats behind the work

Programmes of The Health Initiative

One nonprofit, two programmes

CASRAI is one of two programmes run by The Health Initiative, a U.S. 501(c)(3) nonprofit. The other is a clinical service: physician-led telehealth for people in Puerto Rico. The two are separate programmes under one organisation.