IRIS – Institutional Research Information System

IRIS – Institutional Research Information System is a platform which collates and manages information on research data.
It replaced the “Surplus” software platform (2007-2013) in 2014. All functions and data on facilities, publications, personal profiles, projects, spin-offs, patents, contracts, tenders, fellowships, reports and assessments on Surplus were moved across to IRIS.
In accordance with international standards, IRIS serves as:

  • the sole platform for the collation, validation and distribution (to the Lecturer Site and the departmental pages) of the university’s research data
  • a tool for analysing and evaluating research

IRIS is interoperable: data is imported from the Administrative Department’s databases and from external sources of a bibliographical/bibliometric natural (particularly WOS, Scopus and JCR for citations and Impact Factor).

Lecturers and researchers can insert/import publications, complete the details of the projects they are in charge of, flag up other scientific activities/initiatives or provide information on their scientific curriculum.

Thanks to the BI (Business Intelligence) module, it is possible to obtain statistics and advanced reports (OLAP cubes) on all the data present in IRIS.

IRIS is organised into modules. The main modules are: IR (Institutional Repository), AP (Activities & Projects), RM (Resource Management).

Go to IRIS

IRIS Modules

IR (Institutional Repository)

More commonly known as BOA (Bicocca Open Archive), this is the university’s open research archive. It contains articles, book contributions, essays, conference speeches, doctorate theses and other material. BOA archives, stores and promotes its content, interacts with national and international systems for the management and dissemination of publications and allows imports from other databases (Web of Science, Scopus and Pubmed) and exports in various formats. BOA complies with MIUR and European Commission Open Access requirements.
Only lecturers, researchers, PhD students, research associates, graduate students and technical and administrative staff can store content on BOA. University details are required to do this.

AP (Activities & Projects)

This module is dedicated to the management of activities, contracts and scientific projects. It contains information and data on all activities relating to research: proposals, projects, scientific initiatives, results processing. It is integrated with the university's ERP, particularly the module for economic reporting regarding projects/contracts (UGOV -PJ) and the university’s records.
The module allows users to insert and link data regarding scientific aspects and collaborations/partnerships with institutional research assets (people, groups, equipment, etc.).

RM (Resource Management)

Collates data which supplements information on the world of institutional research regarding:
  • people: personal data, professional relationship, skills, responsibilities (national and international prizes), details for external services (UGOV, Scopus, ORCID etc.)
  • groups, labs, tools
  • incoming and outgoing mobility
  • internal and external organisational structures
  • [information regarding third mission]

Interoperability with ORCID and LoginMIUR

ORCID (Open Researcher and Contributor ID)

This register issues persistent digital alphanumerical identifier known as ORCID codes. The aim of the code is the make it possible to definitively identify scientific authors, solving problems caused by people having the same names, surname variations, shortened names and transliteration.

Each ORCID code has 16 characters made up of numbers between 0 to 9, arranged in groups of four and separated by dashes. It can be found in IRIS > Profile > Details > External Service Details.

IRIS-ORCID interoperability is under development.

LoginMIUR (Lecturer Site)

In Italy, any person who works in science or research is required to fill out a database run by the Ministry of Education, Universities and Research (MIUR). The LoginMIUR database is the basis for national assessment processes (VQR, SUA-RD), lecturer qualification procedures and selections for National Scientific Qualification (ASN) committees. It is also used in support of funding requests.
Data inserted into IRIS (publications, CV updates, prizes etc.) is automatically transferred to the MIUR database every day.

by Sistemi informativi, last updated on 12/03/2020