Skip to content

Goals & Scope

The Heritage Samples Registry (HSR) is designed to provide a practical and sustainable way to assign persistent, globally resolvable identifiers (IGSNs) to physical samples used in heritage science research. Its goals focus on improving the traceability, citation, and long-term discoverability of these often unique and irreplaceable research resources.

The Registry aims to complement existing documentation practices and institutional systems, providing a lightweight identification and linking layer rather than a comprehensive data repository.

Core goals

The primary goals of the Registry are to:

  • Provide persistent, globally unique identifiers for heritage science samples
  • Support reliable citation and discovery of samples in publications, datasets, and reports
  • Enable consistent linking between physical samples and related research outputs
  • Lower barriers to participation through minimal and flexible metadata requirements
  • Complement, rather than replace, existing institutional collection and research systems

Together, these goals support more transparent, reproducible, and connected research practices across the heritage science community.

Scope of the Registry

The Registry is intended to support the identification of a wide range of physical samples used in heritage science, including those taken from works of art, archaeological objects, historic buildings, and reference materials used in conservation and analytical research.

Early testing and development have focused on paint cross-sections and closely related conservation science samples, reflecting the availability of well-structured pilot datasets and active collaboration with partner institutions. However, the underlying model and workflows are designed to be generic, and the Registry can be extended relatively quickly to support additional types of heritage samples as needs arise.

The scope is therefore best understood as broad in principle, but pragmatically phased in practice, with expansion guided by demonstrated research requirements and community engagement.

What is in scope

Within its current design, the Registry will:

  • Assign IGSNs to physical heritage science samples
  • Provide a minimal descriptive landing record for each registered sample
  • Support optional thumbnail images to aid recognition and browsing
  • Enable links to external documentation, datasets, publications, and reports
  • Maintain persistent identification of samples across their research lifecycle

This approach allows samples to be reliably referenced and discovered without requiring institutions to duplicate or relocate their existing data.

What is out of scope

The Registry is not intended to replace existing collection management systems, laboratory databases, or research repositories. In particular, it does not aim to:

  • Host full analytical datasets or detailed conservation records
  • Store large media collections or high-resolution imagery
  • Standardise or enforce local documentation practices
  • Act as a comprehensive documentation platform for all aspects of sample analysis

Instead, detailed information remains within institutional systems and specialised research platforms. The Registry provides the persistent identifier and a lightweight landing record, with key links that can be listed directly but are ideally also maintained and discovered through the wider DOI and persistent identifier infrastructure over time.

Future development and expansion

While initial implementation work has been carried out using paint cross-section datasets, the Registry is designed to support a much wider range of heritage sample types. These may include, for example, fragments, scrapes, thin sections, building material samples, archaeological samples, and reference standards used in analytical research.

Extension to additional domains can be implemented relatively quickly, but will be guided by emerging research needs, available pilot datasets, and active engagement from interested institutions and communities. This ensures that development remains grounded in real-world workflows and sustainable levels of support.

Community-driven evolution

The long-term success of the Registry depends on collaboration across institutions, disciplines, and countries. Its development is therefore intended to be iterative and community-informed, with priorities shaped by practical use cases and shared infrastructure needs within the heritage science domain.

To learn more about the collaborative model and potential audiences for the Registry

See also: