A shared data resource — often combined with shared computing and analysis tools — governed by a community under defined access and contribution rules, designed to enable many users to use and add to the resource for collective benefit.

ByCASRAI Editorial Board

· Last updated 10 Jul 2026

Examples

Worked examples

Is an instance
NCI Genomic Data Commons (gdc.cancer.gov) hosting TCGA and many other cancer-genomic datasets.
Is an instance
AnVIL (NHGRI Analysis Visualization and Informatics Lab-space) for human-genomic data analysis.

Counter-examples

Looks similar, but isn't

Not an instance
A read-only data dump on a website is not a data commons.
Not an instance
A single-institution dataset with no shared tooling or governance is not a data commons.

Editorial commentary

The term draws on Ostrom’s analysis of commons governance and is widely used in biomedical and earth-science research. The NIH National Cancer Institute Genomic Data Commons, the NIH Common Fund Data Ecosystem, and the AnVIL platform are exemplars. A data commons typically combines: a curated data set or federation of data sets; shared compute and tooling co-located with the data; a governance body; and a contribution/access policy that supports inclusion and reuse while protecting sensitive data and contributor rights.

References

Grossman R.L. et al., 'A Case for Data Commons', PLOS Computational Biology 12(6), 2016.
Hudson Institute of Mineralogy and the Australian Research Data Commons concept papers.

Also known as

Research data commons

Machine-readable encodings

Use in your systems

JATS XML <role> element

xml

<role vocab="credit"
      vocab-identifier="https://casrai.org/dictionary/"
      vocab-term="Data commons"
      vocab-term-identifier="https://casrai.org/dictionary/term/data-commons" />

Schema.org DefinedTerm (JSON-LD)

json

{
  "@context": "https://schema.org",
  "@type": "DefinedTerm",
  "@id": "https://casrai.org/dictionary/term/data-commons",
  "name": "Data commons",
  "identifier": "https://casrai.org/dictionary/term/data-commons",
  "description": "A shared data resource — often combined with shared computing and analysis tools — governed by a community under defined access and contribution rules, designed to enable many users to use and add to the resource for collective benefit.",
  "inDefinedTermSet": "https://casrai.org/dictionary/domain/data-infrastructure#set",
  "url": "https://casrai.org/dictionary/term/data-commons",
  "sameAs": [
    "Research data commons"
  ],
  "license": "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/",
  "publisher": {
    "@id": "https://casrai.org/#organization"
  },
  "dateModified": "2026-07-10T02:06:20",
  "inLanguage": "en"
}

Referenced across the research world

View CASRAI adoption →