On June 18, 2026, the National Institute of Health (NIH) released a notice announcing a Request for Information (RFI) on Measuring and Rewarding Scientific Impact. This RFI is an excellent opportunity for the UCSF community to weigh in on approaches for assessing scientific impact beyond scholarly publications and citations, and to focus on the research and societal impacts of other aspects of research activities such as data sharing, mentorship, and entrepreneurship.
This RFI aligns with NIH’s efforts to strengthen the replication and reproducibility of NIH-funded research. The ultimate goal is to incentivize and reward rigorous research that serves the public by “generating knowledge that enhances health, lengthens life, and reduces illness and disability.”
The UCSF Library supports the movement away from assessing scientific impact solely on the basis of publication volume and citation counts, towards the inclusion of the impact of shared data, code, and protocols.
Information requested
NIH is seeking stakeholder input on seven research impact areas:
- Rigor and reproducibility
- Data, software, and model sharing
- Training and mentorship
- Collaboration
- Entrepreneurship and translation
- Foundational scientific exploration
- Public impact
Responses may address all or any of these topics, and may be provided by individuals and organizations. Comments are voluntary and may be submitted anonymously.
The NIH would particularly like comments addressing “specific examples of measurable indicators, implementation approaches, potential benefits or unintended consequences, and considerations for feasibility across career stages, disciplines, and institution types.”
The comment deadline is August 19, 2026.
UCSF response
The UCSF Library will submit comments in response to this RFI in collaboration with the Academic Senate Committee on Library and Scholarly Communication (COLASC). For questions about our response to the RFI, please contact the Scholarly Communication team.
Library services
The UCSF Library provides several services and resources related to measuring and rewarding scientific impact. They include:
- Rigor and reproducibility
- The Data Science and Open Scholarship team provides expert consultations and resources for designing reproducible methods and data analysis plans
- The slides and recordings from a three-part workshop series on reproducibility for biomedical researchers is available online.
- Data, software, and model sharing
- The Reproducible Data Management guide provides guidance on finding and sharing data
- The Data Science and Open Scholarship team offers programming support, workshops, and learning resources
- Collaboration
- Subscription databases such as Dimensions Analytics and Web of Science help researchers identify collaboration networks
- Entrepreneurship and translation
- Patent applications by UCSF researchers and citations to scholarly publications from patents can be searched in Dimensions Analytics
- Public impact
- Alternative metrics help capture attention to published research via news and social media sources, clinical guidelines, clinical trials, and policy documents. Data from the Altmetric service is available in UCSF Profiles, Dimensions Analytics, and the free Altmetric bookmarklet.