When the latest batch of awarded grants data was added to Dimensions this week, the total number of grants in the database topped 5 million for the first time.
And that’s great news for the many funders, publishers and policy makers who rely on that information to guide strategies and support their decision-making.
What makes the Dimensions grants data so unique?
In the same way that an entrepreneur must develop a persuasive “business pitch” to win over potential investors, researchers need to ensure their grant application is detailed and compelling enough to persuade funders to get the green light for their project. In fact, their grant application is often the first time their research idea has been comprehensively captured in a document.
Dimensions not only hosts one of the largest grant data sets in the research community, it is the only platform that links those grants to research organizations, researchers, associated publications, clinical trials, patents, and more. That increases the power of its “crystal ball” effect, offering funders, publishers, research policy strategists, and planners a tantalizing and unique glimpse into the future.
Dimensions’ grants data – the numbers
| Grants | 5,029,296 |
| Research funders covered | 505 |
| Total funding amount | USD 1.6 trillion |
| Total funding amount of projects active in 2019 and beyond | USD 422.9 billion |
| Links to resulting publications | 13,703,423 |
(Data on October 31, 2019)
How the grant data is sourced
Every month, Dimensions scans the databases of a broad range of more than 500 funders to check for new grant data. Before it is added to the database, the new data is cleaned, enriched and standardized, by:
- Converting funding amounts into supported currencies, such as USD, GBP, EUR.
- Translating non-english abstracts and titles.
- Assigning grants to researcher profiles so they can be used to identify experts, e.g. for research collaborations or peer-review tasks.
- Identifying awarded organizations and researchers’ affiliations using GRID (the Global Research Identifier Database).
- Identifying grant acknowledgements in resulting publications, clinical trials and patents.
- Categorizing grants into established classification systems, such as ANZSRC Fields of Research, ICRP Common Scientific Outline, or HRCS Research Activity Codes.
One database to rule them all…
Offering the greatest possible depth of insight has always been a driving goal for Digital Science and the six Digital Science businesses behind the creation of Dimensions. Dimensions aim is to offer a broad view across national and institutional borders on the resource input aspects of the research system, and to combine those data with a broad range of other content types, Delivering a comprehensive overview of the research lifecycle.
Today, more than 200 funders of all shapes and sizes rely on Dimensions data to reach their strategic goals. By viewing the publications, metrics, clinical trials, policies, and patents associated with their awards, they can track the impact of their funding. And that knowledge can feed into other activities, from designing funding strategies and programs to positioning those programs in the international research funding landscape.
Our rich and linked grants data aren’t just useful for funders though. For publishers, Dimensions’ grants data offers a unique window on the future, highlighting developing trends which can be used in their publication planning. Researchers can use the data to find out what their peers are working on, and academic institutions can use Dimensions analytical tools to benchmark themselves against other organizations. The breadth and interconnectivity of the information on offer in Dimensions is also playing an important role in national research policy initiatives and assessment exercises.
Feel free to reach out to the Dimensions team to learn more about how the interlinked grants data in Dimensions can fuel new insights in your organization.