Persistent identifiers (PIDs)

Stephanie Jacobs and Paula Callan

Photo by Osama Elsayed on Unsplash

An identifier is a string of characters that gives a unique name to a person, digital object, resource or entity.  A persistent identifier (PID) is long lasting and, when extended to a fully defined URL, it can be ‘actioned’ online. By that, we mean it becomes a clickable link that will reliably take you to a landing page where you can access the digital object or information about the resource or entity.

In scholarly communication, identifiers are commonly given to researchers,  publications, research data, projects, universities, funders and grants. PIDs play an important role in ensuring the longevity of citations, and are critical in guarding against link rot. Link rot can impede on the discovery process, and may even have more adverse consequences on research outputs. Read this Crossref article for more information on how PIDs are involved in a healthy scholarly ecosystem online.

Getting Started

This section focuses on the two most commonly used identifiers; ORCID and DOI.

An ORCID (Open Researcher and Contributor ID) will correctly identify a specific researcher or contributor even when their name is not unique. This guards against the name ambiguity which can lead to a researcher’s outputs and activities being incorrectly attributed to a different person with a similar name. A DOI (Digital Object Identifier) reliably points to a digital object even when its online location (URL) has changed.  This guards against the problem of link rot (‘page not found’ errors).

ORCID

ORCID iDs are an example of PIDs that assist in maintaining a healthy scholarly ecosystem. ORCID provide researchers with a unique identifier that  persists throughout their career.  An ORCID iD includes 16 digits in blocks of 4, separated by hyphens to aid readability.  When the 16-digits are preceded by “https://orcid.org/” it is actionable online and resolves to a landing page providing more information about the researcher.   For example:  https://orcid.org/0000-0002-1825-0097

ORCID iDs are integrated in key research workflows such as journal manuscript submission, grant application, peer review and research evaluation. There are also many benefits for researchers to having an ORCID iD; the University College of Dublin’s ORCID page gives an overview of these benefits.

Watch “What is ORCID” to learn how authors can use their ORCID iD to distinguish themselves and connect themselves with their activities and publications.

What is ORCID? from ORCID on Vimeo.

Exercise: Go to your institution’s website and look for information regarding the use of ORCID iDs. What did you find? Are ORCID iDs mandated? If you did not find much information, how would you describe the advantages of ORCID iDs in relation to research impact?

The Digital Object Identifier – DOI

Persistent identifiers are also given to digital objects, projects, grants and organizations. The Digital Object Identifier (DOI) is the most universally adopted identifier.

DOIs can be assigned to different levels of the same content. It could be title-level, such as a whole journal or book, or specific, such as an article or chapter. Crossref describes this system like a set of nesting dolls, with each doll having it’s own DOI.

While they are most commonly assigned to publications,  DOIs can also be assigned to datasets, software, and other research outputs to enable linking between research outputs and related data, software and even equipment.

Consider: What are the benefits of object identifiers? How can they aid with discoverability and citation? Does your institution assign DOIs for theses or dissertations and what are the benefits?

 

Learn More

As PIDs can be applied to a broad range of contexts and circumstances, there are many more examples beyond ORCID IDs and DOIs. A few examples include:

 

  • Research Activity Identifiers (RAiD), a persistent identifier design for research projects, which connects researchers, institutions, outputs, and tools. To learn more, watch the video available on the RAiD website.
  • International GeoSample Number (IGSN), which can be used as a persistent identifier for physical objects and specimens. This is particularly useful for the disciplines of archaeology, biology, biomedicine and materials sciences.
  • ResearcherID, an author identifier connected to the Web of Science database. Watch the video “Show your research impact with a Publons Profile” to get an idea of how it works.

 

Consider: What are the benefits of using identifiers for these different circumstances? Do the different identifiers have different benefits? Can you think of any additional use cases for PIDs?

 

Challenge Me

Read “Persistent identifiers: the building blocks of the research information infrastructure“ or “Identifying PIDs playing FAIR” to find out more about how PIDs are aligned with FAIR principles.

 

Exercise:

 

Attribution

Content in this chapter has been developed by QUT Library, including content derived from:

All information correct at time of publication, 19 January 2022.

image credits

Royalty-free images used on this page were sourced from unsplash.com 

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License

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23 Scholarly Communication Things Copyright © 2021 by Stephanie Jacobs and Paula Callan is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International License, except where otherwise noted.

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