Connecting researchers through ORCID

From The Embassy of Good Science

Connecting researchers through ORCID

What is this about?

The ORCID acronym stands for Open Researcher and Contributor Identification. An ORCID identifier helps to connect individual researchers with their work. ORCID is a non-profit organization established and introduced in 2009 in the US. As well as individual researchers, the ORCID community includes universities, laboratories, research companies, funders, publishers, repositories and professional societies.[1].

  1. Distinguish yourself in three easy steps. ORCID website. Available at: https://orcid.org/.

Why is this important?

As a researcher, it is essential to distinguish your work from that of others, not just because publications are valuable for your career, but also because each contribution should be recognized appropriately, fairly and transparently. This is important as sometimes it can be quite challenging to identify authors’ contributions due to long authorship lists, inconsistencies in authorship credit practices, name ambiguities or because a surname has changed.[1] An ORCID identifier is a great way to make sure your contribution as an author is recognized and linked to your research profile. In addition, an ORCID identifier can be used to connect researchers with their data sets.[2]

  1. Granshaw IS. Research Identifiers: ORCID, DOI, and the issue with Wang and Smith. The Photogrammetric Record. 2019; 34(167):236-243.
  2. Credit where credit is due. Nature. 2009; 462(7275):825. Available at: https://www.nature.com/articles/462825a#citeas

For whom is this important?

What are the best practices?

In 2012, ORCID launched their Registry as a result of which researchers could be assigned unique identifiers, a 16-character code compiled of numbers 0-9, and thus distinguish themselves from other researchers. In 2019, there are more than 7 million ORCID accounts[1] registered to individual researchers, universities, scientific publishers and commercial companies. [2] Increasingly, funding organisations are requiring that their applicants provide their ORCID identifier.

  1. ORCID Statistics. ORCID website. Available at: https://orcid.org/statistics
  2. ORCID sponsors. ORCID website. Available at: https://orcid.org/about/community/sponsors.

Other information

Cookies help us deliver our services. By using our services, you agree to our use of cookies.
5.1.6