How to Submit Data¶

Any researcher from the animal telemetry community is welcome to submit data to the ATN DAC. Contributing your data to the ATN DAC is a way to share your research with the general public, as well as other researchers in the animal telemetry community and beyond.

Additionally, submitting data to the ATN DAC may help you meet funding obligations for public data sharing, including federal Public Access to Research Results (PARR) requirements.

For help following the steps below, please contact Dr. Megan McKinzie, the ATN Data Coordinator (DC), at mmckinzie@mbari.org.

Data Submitted through a Satellite Tag Vendor¶

If your telemetry data can be made available to the ATN DAC through a satellite tag vendor (e.g., Wildlife Computers, SMRU), follow these steps:

Step 1: Register your tags¶

Visit the ATN DAC Registration page here: dacregistration.atn.ioos.us
Sign up for an account (or log in if you already have one)
Click New Project Metadata, select Satellite Project. Using the form, enter your project-level metadata (e.g., title, abstract, purpose, and contact info). Click Submit.
Click View, scroll-down, select Add Satellite Deployment. Using the form, enter the information for a single deployment associated with that project (e.g., PTT, species, deployment start/stop date/time). Click Submit. Repeat. Alternatively,
Click View, select Import CSV. Upload a deployment-level metadata csv file (ATN template, data dictionary) to crosswalk the information from all deployments associated with that project (e.g., PTT, species, deployment start/stop date/time).
Click View, select Edit All to modify an existing deployment record(s). Add or edit content in the desired field(s). Save.

After you submit this information, the ATN DC will review your project and deployment metadata, and contact you with questions.

Step 2: Grant the ATN DAC access to your data feeds¶

The ATN DC will then contact the tag vendor(s) (e.g., Wildlife Computers, SMRU) and request data access
Reply to the data access request(s) with your approval for release

Once your project and deployment metadata have been finalized and your data made available to the DAC, your project will appear in the ATN data portal. Embargoed or protected deployment data will only be visualized in the portal along with select metadata, data itself remains secure. Archived data will become publicly accessible through the portal catalog. Additional information can be found within ATN’s data management policy guidance document.

Note

Data feeds made available to the ATN DAC while a tag is actively deployed on an animal will appear in the Real-time tag deployment layers of the ATN data portal map interface. These feeds will also be listed as associated with your project in the ATN data portal project catalog.

Data Submitted Directly to the DAC¶

If your data aren’t available from a satellite tag vendor, you can still submit to the ATN DAC through the following steps:

Visit the ATN DAC’s data management platform, the Research Workspace
Create an account (or log in if you already have one)
Create a new project
Upload your deployment metadata and data files
Work with the ATN DC to publish your data files

Note

Uploading metadata and data files to the Workspace will allow you to publish your data to the ATN data portal project catalog, as well as archive your dataset with a national data center, such as DataONE. Depending on the format of your data, it may also be possible to display them in the ATN data portal map interface. Contact the ATN DC for more information.

For assistance submitting data to ATN DAC through the Research Workspace, please visit the Workspace’s help docs, consult the tutorials listed below, or Contact Us.