“FAIR Workflows to establish IGSN for Samples in the Helmholtz Association” (FAIR WISH) is a joint project between GFZ, AWI and Hereon funded within the HMC Project Cohorte 2020 of the Helmholtz Metadata Collaboration Platform HMC.

The International Generic Sample Number (IGSN) is a globally unique and persistent identifier (PID) for physical samples and collections with discovery function in the internet. IGSNs enable to directly link data and publications with samples they originate from and thus close one of the last gaps in the full provenance of research results.

FAIR WISH will (1) develop standardised and discipline specific IGSN metadata schemes for different samples types within the research field Earth and Environment (EaE) that are complementing the core IGSN metadata schema; and (2) develop workflows to generate machine-readable IGSN metadata from different states of digitisation (from templates to databases) and to automatically register IGSNs. Our use cases were selected to include the large variety of sample types from different sub-disciplines across the project partners (e.g. terrestrial, marine environments, rock, soil, vegetation, water samples) and represent all states of digitization: from individual scientists, collecting sample descriptions in their field books to digital sample management systems fed by an app that is used in the field.

Project presentations and outcome are published within the FAIR WISH Zenodo Community.