The Digital Curation Centre has released Data Dimensions: Disciplinary Differences in Research Data Sharing, Reuse and Long Term Viability: A Comparative Review Based on Sixteen Case Studies.

Here's an excerpt:

This synthesis study, commissioned by the Digital Curation Centre from Key Perspectives Ltd, forms a major output from the DCC SCARP Project, which investigated attitudes and approaches to data deposit, sharing and reuse, curation and preservation, over a range of research fields in differing disciplines. The aim was to investigate research practitioners’ perspectives and practices in caring for their research data, and the methods and tools they use to that end. Objectives included identification and promotion of ‘good practice’ in the selected research domains, as expressed in DCC tools and resources. The approach combined case study methods with a survey of the literature relevant to digital curation in the selected fields. . . .

This synthesis report (which drew on the SCARP case studies plus a number of others, identified in the Appendix), identifies factors that help understand how curation practices in research groups differ in disciplinary terms. This provides a backdrop to different digital curation approaches. However the case studies illustrate that "the discipline" is too broad a level to understand data curation practices or requirements. The diversity of data types, working methods, curation practices and content skills found even within specialised domains means that requirements should be defined at this or even a finer-grained level, such as the research group.

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