Data Access & Use Policy
Principles governing discovery, verification and responsible reuse of datasets listed by JMNS.
JMNS is a curation layer, not the data licensor.
The JMNS Verified Dataset Library helps researchers discover external research datasets that have undergone manual curation. Unless a specific JMNS service explicitly states otherwise, the underlying data remain hosted, controlled and licensed by their authoritative repository or data provider.
A JMNS dataset record does not grant permission to use data and does not override a repository licence, Data Use Agreement, consent condition, ethics requirement or applicable law. Researchers must review the current terms attached to the exact repository record and version they use.
What JMNS Verified means
A JMNS Verified Dataset has been manually checked for repository identity, availability of data-bearing files, relevance to human movement or neuromuscular science, and key documented metadata such as population, measurements, persistent identifiers, access status and reuse conditions.
The record includes a verification date because repository files, versions, licences and access conditions can change. Researchers should therefore confirm the current authoritative record before analysis or publication.
Verification is not certification of methodological quality, absence of bias or error, legal suitability for every use, or fitness for a particular scientific question.
Dataset access
Access is obtained from the authoritative repository or data provider, not from the JMNS search interface. A repository may provide open access, registration, credentialed access, controlled access or another dataset-specific mechanism.
Where a repository or provider requires acceptance of terms or a Data Use Agreement, those conditions must be satisfied through the applicable access procedure before the data are used.
Permitted reuse
Secondary analysis, validation, methodological development, benchmarking, teaching or other uses are permitted only to the extent allowed by the exact dataset licence and applicable terms. Restrictions on commercial use, redistribution, derivatives, participant-level analysis or publication must be respected.
JMNS does not expand the rights granted by the source licence and does not convert restricted data into open data by listing them.
Privacy & confidentiality
Researchers must not attempt to identify or re-identify participants and must protect confidential or potentially identifying information in accordance with consent, ethics approvals, institutional requirements and applicable law.
Pseudonymised human data should not be assumed to be anonymous merely because direct identifiers have been removed. Appropriate access, storage and sharing safeguards remain necessary whenever re-identification is reasonably possible.
Citation, attribution & versioning
Scholarly outputs should cite the dataset itself using the creators, dataset title, repository, year, exact version or release where relevant, and persistent identifier or accession number when available.
The associated primary dataset publication or repository documentation should also be cited when required by the source terms or when scientifically relevant. Access to a dataset does not by itself confer authorship.
Derived data, code & redistribution
Researchers remain responsible for ensuring that derived datasets, transformed files, trained models, figures and code are shared only in ways permitted by the original licence and access terms. Source data should not be redistributed when the governing terms prohibit redistribution.
When new analytical code or workflows materially support a published secondary analysis, JMNS encourages their preservation and sharing under an appropriate licence whenever ethically and legally possible.
Secondary analyses & publication venue
Researchers may develop original analyses and manuscripts from datasets listed in the JMNS Verified Dataset Library or from other appropriate datasets. Any manuscript submitted to JMNS is evaluated under the same scientific, methodological, ethical and editorial standards regardless of where the source dataset was discovered.
Listing or verification of a dataset by JMNS does not require resulting work to be submitted to JMNS. Researchers remain free to choose an appropriate publication venue, subject to the authoritative dataset and repository terms.
Changes to repository records
Repository versions, licences, access conditions or file availability may change after a JMNS verification. The verification date indicates when the JMNS record was last checked; it is not a guarantee that the source remains unchanged.
If a material discrepancy is identified, JMNS may update, annotate or remove the curated record without altering the authoritative repository record itself.
JMNS Data Use Agreement framework
Searching or viewing the Verified Dataset Library does not create a JMNS Data Use Agreement. A JMNS-specific agreement would apply only if a future dataset or service explicitly states that JMNS itself controls access and presents the terms before access is granted.
Use the JMNS record to discover and understand the dataset; use the authoritative repository record to decide what you are permitted to download, analyse, share and publish.
Search verified datasets