What is the CASRAI Dictionary?

The CASRAI Dictionary is a curated, citable, machine-readable controlled vocabulary for research-administration information. v2026.1 contains 1,858 entries spread across 29 thematic domains, each entry with a stable URI, structured picklists, and Schema.org DefinedTerm markup. See the dictionary landing page at /dictionary for the full overview.

How is the Dictionary structured?

The Dictionary is partitioned into 29 thematic domains grouped under 6 stewardship tracks: contributorship, identifiers and systems, computational, governance and integrity, lifecycle and equity, and the research sciences. Each domain is stewarded by a community working group that drafts, reviews, and ratifies its entries. Browse the domain map at /dictionary, or jump to /dictionary/browse for the A-Z view.

Can I propose a new term?

Yes. Working groups review proposals during each release cycle, and community contributions are credited via CRediT-style attribution in the changelog. Open a proposal at /dictionary/contribute; the relevant working group will route it through the review process for the next versioned release.

Under what licence are the definitions released?

The CASRAI Dictionary is published under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International licence (CC-BY 4.0). You may reuse, redistribute, and adapt the content commercially or non-commercially, provided you give appropriate credit. Full terms are on the /legal/license page.

How do I cite the Dictionary?

Each Dictionary release is citable as a Dataset with a versioned URI (https://casrai.org/dictionary/ for v2026.1) and per-entry stable URIs at https://casrai.org/dictionary/term/ . Each release also carries a Zenodo DOI. The /dictionary/cite page provides citation strings in APA, BibTeX, RIS, and Chicago formats for the dictionary, per-release, and per-term levels.

Where do the legacy CASRAI terms come from?

CASRAI was founded in 2006 and built an extensive legacy dictionary before the 2020 stewardship handover. The 2026 revival re-imported and re-published the legacy entries under their original domains, retaining provenance metadata. The current 1,858-entry corpus combines legacy holdings with newly drafted entries. See /dictionary/changelog for per-release migration notes.

How many terms are in the CASRAI Dictionary?

The CASRAI Dictionary currently contains 1,858 terms in release v2026.1, distributed across 29 thematic domains grouped under 6 stewardship tracks. Each term has a stable URI, structured definition, optional picklists, and Schema.org DefinedTerm markup. The next release, v2026.2 in November 2026, expands the corpus with additional sustainability and AI-disclosure entries.

Is the CASRAI Dictionary free?

Yes, the CASRAI Dictionary is free to use. It is published under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International licence (CC-BY 4.0), with no paywall, no registration, and no API spend for read access. You may reuse, redistribute, translate, and bundle it commercially or non-commercially, provided you give appropriate credit to CASRAI.

How do I cite a dictionary term?

To cite a dictionary term, use its stable URI at https://casrai.org/dictionary/term/ together with the dictionary release version. Each term page emits a citation widget producing APA, BibTeX, RIS, and Chicago forms on the fly. To cite the dictionary release as a whole, use the Zenodo DOI listed on /dictionary/cite.

Dictionary · v2026.1 · CC-BY 4.0

The CASRAI Dictionary: A Research Administration Glossary

The CASRAI Dictionary is a citable, machine-readable controlled vocabulary for research administration, containing 1858 definitions across 29 thematic domains in release v2026.1. Stewarded by 29 community working groups; federated with NISO, euroCRIS, CODATA, and RDA; published under CC-BY 4.0 for unrestricted reuse.

Browse all 1858 entries →Search Download v2026.1

What's in v2026.1

Entries: 1858
Domains: 29
Tracks: 5
Open formats: 6

Last updated

2026-09-05

· Stable URIs per entry
· Schema.org DefinedTerm markup
· JATS · JSON-LD · OWL · RDF · CSV · BibTeX
· Versioned with semver-style release tags

Start here

Browse the dictionary

Five ways into the full corpus, plus the 29 thematic domains below. Every entry is a stable, citable URI under CC-BY 4.0.

/dictionary/browse

Browse by domain

Entries grouped by their thematic domain, with status and CRIS-readiness filters.

/dictionary/a-z

A–Z index of all 1858 terms

Every entry, alphabetised under A–Z headings — the complete map of the dictionary.

/rdm-glossary

Research data management glossary

A curated RDM glossary: data infrastructure, DMPs, persistent identifiers, and reproducibility.

/dictionary/objects

Object templates

123 structured business objects — Award, Book, Conference Paper — for CRIS and RIM integration.

/dictionary/picklists

Controlled picklists

Enumerated value-lists — output types, contributor roles, licence types, access types.

/dictionary/templates

Document templates

23 composite documents — CVs, funding history, DMP ethics review — assembled from object fields.

/dictionary/search

Full-text search

Search definitions, picklists, sample values, and crosswalks with type-ahead suggestions.

Jump to a domain

Compliance and regulatory686 Funding lifecycle and financial vocabu…292 Clinical research and clinical trials272 Research integrity and misconduct259 Scholarly publishing207 Grants management and sponsor complian…198 Research outputs (expanded)176 Research data infrastructure160 Responsible research assessment129 The persistent identifier ecosystem106 Research security105 Research-information systems and integ…103 Mentorship, training, and career stage…97 Reproducibility and computational rese…96 Generative AI use and disclosure85 AI and ML research outputs83 Research lifecycle stages and project…78 Knowledge equity, diversity, global-so…74 CRediT extensions and adjacent contrib…64 Technology transfer and commercializat…62 Engagement, impact, and SDG alignment59 Sustainable research and laboratory op…56 Machine-actionable data management pla…39 Life sciences and biology34 Consent, privacy, and regulatory discl…31 Indigenous data governance — CARE prin…24 Earth, environmental, and marine scien…4 Space and planetary sciences4 Physical sciences and materials1

29 domains across 6 tracks

The full domain map

Each domain is stewarded by a working group. Click any tile to read its entries.

Track AContribution5 domains

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

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 DCompliance6 domains

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

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

Track FSciences4 domains

LSBLife sciences and biology EEMSEarth, environmental, and marine sciences SPSSpace and planetary sciences PSMPhysical sciences and materials

Domain breakdown

Entries by domain · 1858 total

The full distribution of dictionary entries across the 29 stewardship domains, ordered by size. Track colour indicates stewardship cluster.

Track D686

Track A · ContributorshipTrack B · Identifiers & systemsTrack C · ComputationalTrack D · Governance & integrityTrack E · Lifecycle & equityTrack F · Sciences

Highlighted terms by domain

One representative entry per domain

A curated tour of high-value definitions — one entry per stewardship domain, chosen to illustrate the breadth of the dictionary in practice.

AI-assisted writing

Text produced with substantive help from a generative AI system, requiring disclosure under most publisher policies.

GenAI disclosureread →

Lead / equal / supporting qualifier

Modifier appended to a CRediT role to declare relative degree of contribution within that role on a paper.

CRediT extensionsread →

Narrative CV

Structured-prose researcher biography (Royal Society, UKRI, NIH) replacing publication-list-driven assessment.

Career stagesread →

Registered report

Two-stage publication where methodology is peer-reviewed and accepted before data collection begins.

Research outputsread →

ORCID iD

Sixteen-digit researcher identifier resolvable at orcid.org, used to disambiguate authorship across systems.

Identifiersread →

CERIF

euroCRIS data-model standard for Current Research Information Systems, defining entities for persons, projects, outputs.

RIS / CRISread →

Trusted Research Environment

Secure analysis platform where sensitive data is held centrally and researchers bring their code, not the other way around.

Data infrastructureread →

Data management plan (DMP)

Living document declaring how research data will be collected, stored, shared, and preserved across the project lifecycle.

maDMPread →

Reproducibility

Capacity of an independent party to obtain the same result using the original code, data, and computational environment.

Reproducibilityread →

Model card

Structured documentation of an ML model: training data, intended use, performance, limitations, and ethical considerations.

AI/ML outputsread →

Paper mill

Commercial operation that fabricates manuscripts and authorship slots for sale, a growing integrity threat to journals.

Integrityread →

GDPR

EU regulation governing personal-data processing, with extraterritorial reach and direct implications for research data.

Complianceread →

NSPM-33

US National Security Presidential Memorandum 33 mandating disclosure of foreign affiliations on federally funded research.

Research securityread →

CARE principles

Collective benefit, Authority to control, Responsibility, Ethics — Indigenous Peoples’ data governance principles, complementing FAIR.

Indigenous dataread →

DORA

San Francisco Declaration on Research Assessment, calling for an end to journal-impact-factor-based evaluation of researchers.

Assessment reformread →

Plan S

cOAlition S mandate requiring immediate open access for publications arising from publicly funded research.

Knowledge equityread →

PPI (patient and public involvement)

Research carried out with or by patients and members of the public, not merely about or for them.

Engagement & impactread →

LEAF framework

Laboratory Efficiency Assessment Framework — bronze/silver/gold certification for sustainable laboratory operations.

Sustainable researchread →

MTDC

Modified Total Direct Cost — the cost base on which US federal indirect-cost rates are calculated, excluding equipment and subawards above $25k.

Funding & financeread →

Project ID (RAiD-anchored)

Research Activity Identifier (RAiD) handle anchoring a project across funders, institutions, outputs, and contributors.

Lifecycleread →

Featured entries

Browse

The dictionary sits inside a broader stewardship programme. These adjacent surfaces extend the same vocabulary into roles, adoption tracking, crosswalks, governance, and source bibliography.

/credit

CRediT taxonomy

The 14 contributor roles (conceptualization, methodology, software, writing — original draft, etc.) and the canonical role definitions.

/credit/adoption

Publisher CRediT adoption tracker

Which journals and publishers ingest CRediT taxonomy contributor roles, with adoption status and submission-system support.

/federation/cross-walks

Crosswalks

Field-level mappings from CASRAI entries to DataCite, MARC, ORCID, Schema.org, and other vocabularies.

/about/working-groups

Working groups

The 20 stewardship working groups that draft, review, and ratify dictionary entries on a rolling release cadence.

/standards/releases

Release history

Per-release changelog of added, modified, and deprecated entries since the 2026 revival of CASRAI stewardship.

/resources/bibliography

Foundational bibliography

Peer-reviewed and grey-literature sources underpinning the dictionary entries, organised by domain and theme.

About

What the dictionary is

Provenance, governance, scope, and how the dictionary relates to NISO / euroCRIS / CODATA standards.

Contribute

Propose a term

Working groups review proposals during each release cycle. Community contributions get CRediT attribution.

Releases

v2026.1 release notes

Added, modified, and deprecated entries since the previous release. Versioned and citable.

For implementers and citers

Open, machine-readable, freely reusable

CASRAI Dictionary content is published under CC-BY 4.0. Use it in your CRIS, repository, publisher submission system, CRediT-aware editorial workflow, or in your own controlled-vocabulary infrastructure.

GraphQL API →For LLMs & RAG →CC-BY 4.0 licence →

Frequently asked

Dictionary FAQ

What is the CASRAI Dictionary?: The CASRAI Dictionary is a curated, citable, machine-readable controlled vocabulary for research-administration information. v2026.1 contains 1,858 entries spread across 29 thematic domains, each entry with a stable URI, structured picklists, and Schema.org DefinedTerm markup. See about the dictionary for scope and provenance.
How is the Dictionary structured?: The Dictionary is partitioned into 29 thematic domains grouped under 6 stewardship tracks: contributorship, identifiers and systems, computational, governance and integrity, lifecycle and equity, and the research sciences. Each domain is stewarded by a community working group that drafts, reviews, and ratifies its entries. Browse the domain map at /dictionary, or jump to /dictionary/browse for the A-Z view.
Can I propose a new term?: Yes. Working groups review proposals during each release cycle, and community contributions are credited via CRediT-style attribution in the changelog. Open a proposal at /dictionary/contribute; the relevant working group will route it through the review process for the next versioned release.
Under what licence are the definitions released?: The CASRAI Dictionary is published under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International licence (CC-BY 4.0). You may reuse, redistribute, and adapt the content commercially or non-commercially, provided you give appropriate credit. Implementation patterns are documented under /implement.
How do I cite the Dictionary?: Each Dictionary release is citable as a Dataset with a versioned URI (e.g. https://casrai.org/dictionary/ for v2026.1) and per-entry stable URIs at https://casrai.org/dictionary/term/<slug>. The cite page provides citation strings in APA, BibTeX, and RIS formats.
Where do the legacy CASRAI terms come from?: CASRAI was founded in 2006 and built an extensive legacy dictionary before the 2020 stewardship handover. The 2026 revival re-imported and re-published the legacy entries under their original domains, retaining provenance metadata. The current1,858-entry corpus combines legacy holdings with newly drafted entries. See /about/history for the timeline and /dictionary/changelog for per-release migration notes.
How many terms are in the CASRAI Dictionary?: The CASRAI Dictionary currently contains 1,858 terms in release v2026.1, distributed across 29 thematic domains grouped under 6 stewardship tracks. Each term has a stable URI, structured definition, optional picklists, and Schema.org DefinedTerm markup. The next release, v2026.2 in November 2026, expands the corpus with additional sustainability and AI-disclosure entries. See /dictionary/changelog.
Is the CASRAI Dictionary free?: Yes, the CASRAI Dictionary is free to use. It is published under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International licence (CC-BY 4.0), with no paywall, no registration, and no API spend for read access. You may reuse, redistribute, translate, and bundle it commercially or non-commercially, provided you give appropriate credit to CASRAI.
How do I cite a dictionary term?: To cite a dictionary term, use its stable URI at https://casrai.org/dictionary/term/<slug> together with the dictionary release version. Each term page emits a citation widget producing APA, BibTeX, RIS, and Chicago forms on the fly. To cite the release as a whole, use the Zenodo DOI listed on /dictionary/cite.

Programmes of The Health Initiative

One nonprofit, two programmes

This dictionary is published by CASRAI, a programme of The Health Initiative. The nonprofit’s other programme is a telehealth service in Puerto Rico.

The Health Initiative telehealth programme
Care for people in Puerto Rico
Dr. Diana Nieves Castro, MD
General practice physician · PR licence 24027
About The Health Initiative
CASRAI’s parent 501(c)(3) nonprofit