Fair principles: Interpretations and implementation considerations

The FAIR principles have been widely cited, endorsed and adopted by a broad range of stakeholders since their publication in 2016. By intention, the 15 FAIR guiding principles do not dictate specific technological implementations, but provide guidance for improving Findability, Accessibility, Interoperability and Reusability of digital resources. This has likely contributed to the broad adoption of the FAIR principles, because individual stakeholder communities can implement their own FAIR solutions. However, it has also resulted in inconsistent interpretations that carry the risk of leading to incompatible implementations. Thus, while the FAIR principles are formulated on a high level and may be interpreted and implemented in different ways, for true interoperability we need to support convergence in implementation choices that are widely accessible and (re)-usable. We introduce the concept of FAIR implementation considerations to assist accelerated global participation and convergence towards accessible, robust, widespread and consistent FAIR implementations. Any self-identified stakeholder community may either choose to reuse solutions from existing implementations, or when they spot a gap, accept the challenge to create the needed solution, which, ideally, can be used again by other communities in the future. Here, we provide interpretations and implementation considerations (choices and challenges) for each FAIR principle.

The work of A. Jacobsen, C. Evelo, M. Thompson, R. Cornet, R. Kaliyaperuma and M. Roos is supported by funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation program under the EJP RD COFUND-EJP N° 825575. The work of A. Jacobsen, C. Evelo, C. Goble, M. Thompson, N. Juty, R. Hooft, M. Roos, S-A. Sansone, P. McQuilton, P. Rocca-Serra and D. Batista is supported by funding from ELIXIR EXCELERATE, H2020 grant agreement number 676559. R. Hooft was further funded by NL NWO NRGWI. obrug.2018.009. N. Juty and C. Goble were funded by CORBEL (H2020 grant agreement 654248). N. Juty, C. Goble, S-A. Sansone, P. McQuilton, P. Rocca-Serra and D. Batista were funded by FAIRplus (IMI grant agreement 802750). N. Juty, C. Goble, M. Thompson, M. Roos, S-A. Sansone, P. McQuilton, P. Rocca-Serra and D. Batista were funded by EOSClife H2020-EU (grant agreement number 824087). C. Goble was funded by DMMCore (BBSRC BB/M013189/). M. Thompson, M. Roos received funding from NWO (VWData 400.17.605). S-A. Sansone, P. McQuilton, P. Rocca-Serra and D. Batista have been funded by grants awarded to S-A. Sansone from the UK BBSRC and Research Councils (BB/L024101/1; BB/L005069/1), EU (H2020-EU 634107; H2020-EU 654241, IMI (IMPRiND 116060), NIH Data Common Fund, and from the Wellcome Trust (ISA-InterMine 212930/Z/18/Z; FAIRsharing 208381/A/17/Z). The work of A. Waagmeester has been funded by grant award number GM089820 from the National Institutes of Health. M. Kersloot was funded by the European Regional Development Fund (KVW-00163). The work of N. Meyers was funded by the National Science Foundation (OAC 1839030). The work of M.D. Wilkinson is funded by Isaac Peral/Marie Curie cofund with the Universidad Politécnica de Madrid and the Ministerio de Economía y Competitividad grant number TIN2014-55993-RM. The work of B. Magagna, E. Schultes, L. da Silva Santos and K. Jeffery is funded by the H2020-EU 824068. The work of B. Magagna, E. Schultes and L. da Silva Santos is funded by the GO FAIR ISCO grant of the Dutch Ministry of Science and Culture. The work of G. Guizzardi is supported by the OCEAN Project (FUB). M. Courtot received funding from the Innovative Medicines Initiative 2 Joint Undertaking under grant agreement No. 802750. R. Cornet was further funded by FAIR4Health (H2020-EU grant agreement number 824666). K. Jeffery received funding from EPOS-IP H2020-EU agreement 676564 and ENVRIplus H2020-EU agreement 654182.

Peer reviewed