Shared vocabularies for research administration.

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The same standards, translated for the people who use them: authors, institutions, publishers, integrators. Worked examples, templates, FAQs.

4 audience hubs · 7 verticals

Layer 3 · Editorial

News, perspectives, working groups

What's changing in research-administration standards — and how to operate inside that change. Annual reports + monthly bulletin.

State of CRediT 2026 just published

All 14 roles in detail →Statement builder ↗

Browse by research cluster

Nine topical clusters

Every guide, comparison, and definition on the site belongs to one of nine research-administration clusters. Each cluster pillar is the hub for its sub-topics and worked guidance.

CRediT & Authorship Attribution

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

Research Data Management

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

Persistent Identifiers & CRIS

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

Research Integrity & Compliance

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

Scholarly Publishing

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

Scholarly Writing

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

Grants Management & Funding

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

Technology Transfer & Innovation

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

Clinical Research Administration

Trial operations, regulatory pathways, and billing compliance.

Flagship standard

The Contributor Roles Taxonomy

Fourteen standardised roles for attributing contributions to scholarly research outputs. Originated 2012; CASRAI-stewarded from 2014; formalised as ANSI/NISO Z39.104-2022. Used by 50+ publishers across thousands of journals.

Conceptualization
Data curation
Formal analysis
Funding acquisition
Investigation
Methodology
Project administration
Resources
Software
Supervision
Validation
Visualization
Writing — original draft
Writing — review & editing

Featured this release

Selected dictionary entries

A taste of what's inside v2026.1 — pull any entry to see its definition, picklists, related terms, and citation form.

Browse all 1,610 entries →

Amendment Clauses: Why Verbal Changes to a Vendor Contract Usually Don’t Count

An amendment clause (also called a written-amendment clause or a 'no oral modification' / NOM clause) is the boilerplate provision stating that a vendor contract can be changed -- amended, modified, supplemented, or waived -- only by a document that is (1) in writing and (2) signed by an authorized representative of both parties. What makes a proposed change qualify as a valid amendment under this clause, rather than just something a vendor employee said or agreed to, is that it satisfies both elements together: an unsigned email discussing a change, a verbal agreement over the phone, or a handshake understanding at a site visit does not amend the contract -- no matter how clearly both sides intended it -- unless it is captured in a writing signed by someone with actual authority to bind each party.

Entire Agreement (Integration) Clauses in Vendor Contracts

An entire agreement clause (also called an integration clause or merger clause) is a contract provision stating that the signed written document constitutes the complete and final agreement between the parties on its subject matter, superseding all prior drafts, emails, verbal statements, and negotiations that preceded signature. What makes a provision an entire agreement clause specifically, rather than just a signed contract, is that it invokes the parol evidence rule to exclude outside evidence -- a sales rep's verbal promise or an earlier email -- from being used to add to or contradict the written terms once a court finds the contract fully integrated.

Waiver Clause: Why Excusing One Breach Doesn’t Waive Future Enforcement Rights

A waiver clause (also called a No Waiver or Non-Waiver clause) is a vendor-contract provision stating that a party's failure or delay in enforcing any contract right, or its acceptance of a late or non-conforming performance on one occasion, does not waive that right and does not excuse the other party's future compliance -- unless a waiver is made expressly, in a signed writing that identifies the specific right or provision. Three elements distinguish a waiver clause from a general courtesy or informal accommodation: (1) it addresses conduct-based (implied) waiver specifically, not an express written waiver, which remains fully effective if one is actually signed; (2) it confines any excused breach to that single instance -- excusing one late delivery does not excuse the next one, and does not waive the right to enforce the underlying deadline term going forward; and (3) it is a defensive backstop against a party's own leniency being read as a course-of-dealing modification of the contract, distinct from the cure-period mechanic (which governs notice-and-fix timing for a specific breach) and from termination rights (which the waiver clause preserves rather than creates).

Non-Solicitation Clauses in Vendor Contracts

A non-solicitation clause in a vendor contract is a mutual provision under which each party agrees not to directly recruit, hire, or induce away the other party's employees who worked on the engagement, typically for the contract term plus a defined tail period afterward (commonly 12-24 months) -- distinct from a non-compete clause, which restricts competing in the marketplace rather than recruiting specific staff. What makes it a non-solicitation clause specifically is that it targets active, directed recruitment of identified individuals, not an employee's own initiative to leave, and not the parties' general ability to compete for the same business.

Notice Requirements in Vendor Contracts: How and Where Notice Must Be Delivered

A vendor contract's notice clause (also called a notices provision) governs how a party must formally communicate certain events under the agreement -- most consequentially termination, default, and cure notices -- as distinct from ordinary day-to-day communication. What makes a communication qualify as 'notice' under this clause, rather than just an email or phone call someone happened to receive, is that it satisfies three things the clause itself specifies: it uses one of the clause's designated delivery methods (commonly certified or registered mail, hand delivery, a nationally recognized overnight courier with tracking, or email only if the clause explicitly lists email, often paired with a delivery or read-receipt requirement); it is sent to the exact address and named contact or title the clause designates, which is frequently not the buyer's or vendor's day-to-day account representative; and it is treated as received on whatever date the clause's own deemed-receipt rule sets -- actual delivery date, a fixed number of days after mailing, or the next business day for email -- rather than the date it was sent or the date someone actually opened it.

Severability Clauses in Vendor Contracts

A severability clause (also called a savings clause) is a contract provision stating that if a court or arbitrator finds any single provision of the agreement illegal, invalid, or unenforceable, that finding does not void the rest of the contract -- the remaining provisions stay in force, and the unenforceable clause is either deleted or narrowed ('blue-penciled') to the extent the law allows. What makes it a severability clause specifically, rather than a passing legal formality, is that it converts uncertain common-law severability doctrine -- which many but not all courts apply by default -- into an explicit, negotiated statement of the parties' intent: keep the rest of the deal alive around one bad provision, rather than leave a court to decide from scratch whether the whole agreement is inseverable and void.

GDGenerative AI use and disclosure CECRediT extensions and adjacent contribution vocabularies MCSMentorship, training, and career stages ROResearch outputs (expanded)PScholarly publishing

Twenty-four domains · Five tracks

The full domain map

The Dictionary is organised into 24 thematic domains across 5 tracks — from contribution and identifiers to compliance, methods, and assessment reform. Each domain is stewarded by a working group.

Track AContribution5 domains

Track BIdentifiers3 domains

PIThe persistent identifier ecosystem RISResearch-information systems and integration DIResearch data infrastructure

Track CData & methods3 domains

MADMachine-actionable data management plans RReproducibility and computational research AMROAI and ML research outputs

Track DCompliance5 domains

RIResearch integrity and misconduct CRCompliance and regulatory RSResearch security IDCIndigenous data governance — CARE principles CRClinical research and clinical trials

Track EAssessment8 domains

RAResponsible research assessment KEKnowledge equity, diversity, global-south inclusion EISEngagement, impact, and SDG alignment SRSustainable research and laboratory operations FFFunding lifecycle and financial vocabulary GMGrants management and sponsor compliance RLResearch lifecycle stages and project metadata TTTechnology transfer and commercialization

All 24 domains in detail →

The PID ecosystem

Five identifiers, one research artefact

Modern research administration runs on persistent identifiers. ORCID for the researcher, ROR for the institution, RAiD (ISO 23527:2022) for the project, DOI for the output, and IGSN / PIDINST for samples and instruments.

ORCID — Person — required by most funders + publishers
ROR — Organisation — replacing GRID
RAiD — Project — formal ISO standard since 2022
DOI — Outputs — Crossref + DataCite + mEDRA
IGSN / PIDINST — Samples and instruments — DataCite-stewarded

→ PID stack for researchers → ORCID vs ROR vs RAiD comparison

Built to interoperate, not duplicate

Our work, alongside other standards bodies

CASRAI does not re-derive what NISO, euroCRIS, CODATA, RDA, ORCID, Crossref, DataCite, and ARDC already steward — several trace to CASRAI assets transferred to them in 2020. We cross-walk and incubate against their standards — see our standards & releases catalogue for the full list of normative outputs, and regional hubs for adoption status by country.

See how our standards align →

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The same standards, for the people who use them

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