Mobilizing the Biocatalysis Community for Reproducible and Reusable Data Collection

To achieve further breakthroughs in the fields of biocatalysis, protein engineering, metabolic engineering and synthetic biology, enhanced reporting and standardization of high-quality experimental data are essential to improve data availability, comparability, and reuse. Our experience with the specialized Pan-European COZYME community network enabled us to gather a significant amount of data on enzyme stability, solubility, and activity, and it taught us several valuable lessons. For effective long-term improvements, multiple changes must be in place. Here, we propose several actions that can promote such a shift in the scientific culture. Some examples include the default proceedings for publishing data in scientific papers, along with the standardization and FAIRness of the published data. Sustainability requires governance beyond a single project cycle and funding models that combine modest community membership fees with competitive grants focused on interoperability. An example of this model is ELIXIR (https://elixir-europe.org/), an intergovernmental organization that brings together life science resources from across Europe, coordinating them so that they form a single infrastructure. ELIXIR is partly funded through state member contributions (often channeled through member organizations) and also supported by European and international grants. The successful implementation of some of the changes proposed here will permanently benefit the entire scientific community and biotechnology industries.