Addgene’s Data Hub provides a place for scientists to share their protocols and results using AAV vectors. This community-driven resource fills the gap between published AAV methods and all of the troubleshooting efforts scientists perform that are often not published.
Benefits of contributing
Sharing data through the Data Hub empowers users and accelerates research and discovery. By contributing to this resource, you will be adding to the collective knowledge base, saving you and your colleagues time and money, and ultimately speeding scientific progress. You can share troubleshooting steps, negative data, and other details not typically included in traditional publications, all of which benefits you and other researchers working with AAV. In addition, you will be rewarded for submitting your data!
Get recognition for your work.
Be appreciated by your fellow scientists.
Score some prizes!
What to expect
Submission
Submit details about the virus and injections, images, and a description of the results.
Review
Addgene will review your submission for clarity, methodological completeness, and image quality.
Publication
Your data report will be accessible on the Data Hub, to help you and other scientists accelerate their work.
Reward
Be a part of the mission for open science and earn rewards such as Addgene discounts or prizes!
Once your submission has been received, our expert curation team will review the report and work with you to ensure the report meets our submission standards. We will send you a link to preview the report before publishing. When it is published, your Data Hub report will receive a citable DOI and will meet FAIR (Link opens in a new window) data-sharing guidelines.
Prepare to make your submission impactful and citable
Addgene’s Data Hub was created in order to share curated and reviewed data. This includes reports of negative or unexpected outcomes, and details that may not be included in other publications. In order to ensure high quality data, we have set standards for submission criteria and at this time we can only accept reports describing experiments conducted with a viral prep distributed through Addgene or the Caltech CLOVER Center (Link opens in a new window).
A great submission includes:
Images that clearly show viral spread and cellular tropism* (min. 300 dpi, PNG format)
At least two replicates of your experiment*
Functional data, if the report describes a functional vector such as a channelrhodopsin
Images showing the injection site as well as the target region, if the report describes a retrograde serotype
An abstract that summarizes your experiment clearly and concisely*
*required for a DOI.
Helpful Tips
Label your images
Without labels, your image is just a pretty picture!
A more helpful image will include:
Labels to identify relevant brain nuclei and scale
Captions that describe the channel imaged, a color legend for probes/dyes/labels, and the type of microscope and objective used
For example:
Caption: AAV9 was injected into the A2 noradrenergic area of the caudal NST. (A.) Low magnification image showing viral spread. (B.) High-magnification images immuno-stained against dopamine beta-hydroxylase (DBH, magenta) to label norepinephrine (NE) expressing neurons and GFP (green) to label neurons transduced by the virus. Sections were imaged on an Olympus FV1000 upright confocal microscope, 20x Plan C Achromat dry objective.
Share non-copyrighted images
Data submitted to the Data Hub is licensed under Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (CC BY 4.0) (Link opens in a new window), meaning users will be free to share, adapt, and reuse the report as long as they provide appropriate attribution.
Images and data that are already published may have copyright restrictions associated with them. If you would like to include published images or data in your submission, you will need to check with the publisher and obtain permission to use them in the Data Hub.
Share your negative or unexpected data!
Negative data is highly sought after and is encouraged for submission to the Data Hub. Negative expression data can be attributed to a number of variables including a serotype that does not infect your cells of interest, a pathway not transduced by the retrograde serotype, or an unresponsive promoter. Negative data should be accompanied by proper controls to rule out technical variables.
Control data can be:
A different serotype or promoter that shows expression in your cells of interest under the same conditions
For retrograde vectors, a different pathway that is effectively transduced with the virus
Expression in cells or brain regions adjacent to your cells of interest that are not expressing the transgene
We encourage you to discuss any unexpected results and potential reasons for them and provide any tips for improving vector performance.
Share your functional data
How a genetic tool functions in a given system is an important aspect of using AAV vectors. Please include this functional AAV data along with your expression data.
Describe your experimental procedure and outcomes in the “Functional Testing” field in the Other Details section of the submission form.
Upload your functional data figures in the Images section of the submission form. Be sure to include a caption describing the experiment.
