A data paper is a publication of documented data sets in a data journal. The accompanying documentation describes how, when and why the data was collected and what the product contains.

A data paper should consist of at least the following sections:

• introduction (context information and an explanation of the data set's potential)
• methods (type of data collection, sampling methods, materials and codes used, usage licences)
• description of the data set (descriptors and identifiers of the data)

A list of data journals which primarily publish data papers can be found here: forschungsdaten.org, opens an external URL in a new window.