What is a data availability statement? What kind of links/URLs should I give for the statement?

Data availability statements are used in research paper publications to describe where the underlying data for a research paper can be accessible, typically with hyperlinks to the data. Some publishers such as SpringerNature, Wiley, Taylor & Francis provide templates for authors to use for their data availability statements.

Here is an example of data availability statements: 
"The data that support the findings of this study are openly available in [repository name] at http://doi.org/[doi]"

If you deposit your data in DR-NTU (Data), you can use the following info:

1. [repository name] : NTU research data repository DR-NTU (Data)
2. [doi] : get the DOI from your dataset
    
    
3. Using the example above, the availability statement would be:
   "The data that support the findings of this study are openly available in NTU research data repository DR-NTU (Data) at http://doi.org/10.21979/N9/1CRLCJ"

Depending on your journal’s guidelines, you can give your data availability statement to your journal as soon as your paper has been accepted, or earlier. You can give the DOI for the statement, even when your dataset is still unpublished. The DOI will not change when you publish it later. Just remember to publish your dataset no later than the publication date of your paper. Otherwise, readers of your journal paper who click the DOI in your data availability statement will experience a broken link. If the journal (and/or peer reviewer) would like to view the unpublished dataset first, you could share with them a private URL of the unpublished dataset. 

Examples of paper publications with data availability statement:

• Example 1 (from PLOS ONE)
• Example 2 (from Nature Communications)