From MSN News: “According to a study by Timothy H. Vines, et al. titled ‘The Availability of Research Data Declines Rapidly with Article Age,’ published last week in Current Biology, most raw data from scientific papers published twenty years ago is unobtainable – either because authors have since changed their contact information and can’t be reached or because the data was stored using outdated technology, like floppy disks.”
This study confirms the importance of policies requiring proper archiving of research data. For more information about data archiving, please contact the Sciences Library.