The UniProt website API: facilitating programmatic access to protein knowledge is a dataset published in Nucleic Acids Research (2025). On theSindex it has a DataRank of 1.2, placing it in the top 16.7% of the data-sharing corpus. It has been cited 153 times, with 100 citing works in its 1-hop citation network. Its calibrated FAIR score is 21/100.
Ranks in the top 17% for downstream scientific impact
Linked data & code
DataRank reads this dataset's downstream impact straight off the citation graph — no black box, no proprietary weighting. How is this computed?
FAIR checklist signals are shown for context only and do not affect DataRank scoring.
Full FAIR picture · advisory
The headline score is computed from the scored criteria — the fact-shaped checks (a repository, an accession, a licence) that two independent models agree on. The advisory criteria below are real FAIR guidance but rest on judgment calls that models read differently, so they inform without moving the number.
The paper does not assign a persistent identifier (DOI, Handle, ARK, or repository accession) to its own dataset; the API URL is not a PID scheme. [majority verdict 'no' (4/5 passes agreed)]
RDA-F1-01D — FAIR Data Maturity Model: 'Data is identified by a persistent identifier' (priorit · RDA-F1-02D — FAIR Data Maturity Model: 'Data is identified by a globally unique identifier' · FsF-F1-02D — F-UJI/FAIRsFAIR: 'Data is assigned a persistent identifier'
The paper does not name a repository holding the study's own data; the data is the API service itself, not deposited in a repository.
RDA-F4-01M — FAIR Data Maturity Model: metadata is offered so it can be harvested and indexed ( · NIH DMS Policy Element 4 (NOT-OD-21-014) — name the repository where data will be archived · NSTC Desirable Characteristics of Data Repositories (2022) — 'Long-Term Sustainability', 'Reten
No identifier for the study's own dataset appears in the reference list or body text; the paper describes an API, not a dataset. [majority verdict 'no' (4/5 passes agreed)]
FORCE11 Joint Declaration of Data Citation Principles (2014) — data should be cited as a first- · RDA-F3-01M — metadata clearly and explicitly includes the identifier of the data it describes · FsF-F3-01M — F-UJI: 'Metadata includes the identifier of the data it describes'
Advisory · not in the published score
“API is freely available at https://rest.uniprot.org/ . API documentation is freely available at https://www.uniprot.org/api-documentation/”
The data-availability statement points to a URL (the API endpoint), not a repository record with an accession or DOI, so it falls under Colavizza category 2 (data in the article or supplementary) or a link. However, the statement exists and provides a URL, which is not a repository record, so it is partial. [majority verdict 'partial' (4/5 passes agreed)]
Colavizza, Hrynaszkiewicz, Staden, Whitaker & McGillivray (2020), 'The citation advantage of li · Springer Nature research data policy — Data Availability Statements: standard statement templat · RDA-F3-01M — metadata clearly and explicitly includes the identifier of the data it describes
The paper does not provide an itemised inventory of the dataset's files, variables, or samples; it describes the API and the UniProt databases generically.
RDA-F2-01M — 'Rich metadata is provided to allow discovery' (priority Essential) · FsF-F2-01M — F-UJI: 'Metadata includes descriptive core elements to support data findability' · FsF-R1-01MD — F-UJI: 'Metadata specifies the content of the data'
“This website is free and open to all users, and there is no login requirement.”
The text states the API is freely available without any precondition such as login, registration, or embargo. [majority verdict 'yes' (3/5 passes agreed)]
RDA-A1.1-01D — 'Data is accessible through a free access protocol' · FsF-A1-01M — F-UJI: 'Metadata contains access level and access conditions of the data' · NSTC Desirable Characteristics of Data Repositories (2022) — 'Free and Easy Access'
Advisory · not in the published score
“The UniProt REST API is a freely available, open-access resource”
The paper explicitly labels the API as 'open-access' and 'freely available', which is a natural-language equivalent of the standard access-label vocabulary. [majority verdict 'yes' (3/5 passes agreed)]
FsF-A1-01M — F-UJI: 'Metadata contains access level and access conditions of the data' · RDA-A1-01M — metadata contains information to enable the user to get access to the data · COAR Controlled Vocabularies — Access Rights v1.0 (open / embargoed / restricted / metadata-onl
The paper does not involve sensitive or human-subject data; no gatekeeper is named or needed.
NIH Genomic Data Sharing Policy (NOT-OD-14-124) — controlled-access via a Data Access Committee · RDA-A1.2-01D — 'Data is accessible through an access protocol that supports authentication and · NIH DMS Policy Element 5 (NOT-OD-21-014) — Access, Distribution, or Reuse Considerations (conse
The paper does not state any retention period or persistence commitment for the study's own data (the API service).
NIH DMS Plan Element 4 (NOT-OD-21-014) — Data Preservation, Access, and Associated Timelines · NSTC Desirable Characteristics (2022), Organizational Infrastructure: 'Retention Policy' · RDA-A2-01M — 'Metadata is guaranteed to remain available after data is no longer available'
The paper mentions that the API returns data in formats like JSON, XML, FASTA, but these are formats for the response, not for the study's own dataset. The study's own data (the API) has no file format named. [majority verdict 'no' (3/5 passes agreed)]
FsF-R1.3-02D — F-UJI: 'Data is available in a file format recommended by the target research co · RDA-R1.3-02D — data is expressed in a machine-understandable community standard · RDA-I1-01D — data uses a knowledge representation expressed in a standardised format
Advisory · not in the published score
No community-standard vocabulary or checklist (e.g., MIAME, GO) is explicitly named and applied to the study's own data.
RDA-R1.3-01M — 'Metadata complies with a community standard' (priority Essential) · RDA-R1.3-01D — 'Data complies with a community standard' · RDA-I2-01M — '(Meta)data use vocabularies that follow FAIR principles'
The study does not produce a dataset that could depend on other resources; no identifiers for external resources are provided in the context of the study's own data. [majority verdict 'no' (3/5 passes agreed)]
RDA-I3-01M — '(meta)data include references to other (meta)data' · RDA-I3-03M — 'metadata includes qualified references to other metadata' · FsF-I3-01M — F-UJI: 'Metadata includes links between the data and its related entities'
No license is attached to the study's data (the API); the CC-BY license at the footer applies to the article, not the data.
RDA-R1.1-01M — 'Metadata includes information about the licence under which the data can be reu · RDA-R1.1-02M — 'Metadata refers to a standard reuse licence' · RDA-R1.1-03M — 'Metadata refers to a machine-understandable reuse licence'
The paper mentions a data release version (2025_01) for the UniProt data, but not for the study's own data (the API). No version token is given for the API itself.
DataCite Metadata Schema 4.6 — the 'Version' property · RDA-R1.2-01M — provenance information (which version was used is provenance) · NSTC Desirable Characteristics of Data Repositories (2022) — 'Provenance', 'Retention Policy'
The paper does not provide a locator (URL, DOI, or package identifier) for the study's own code; the API is a service, not shared code.
NIH DMS Policy Element 2 (NOT-OD-21-014) — 'Related Tools, Software and/or Code' · FAIR4RS Principles v1.0 (Chue Hong et al., 2022; RDA/FORCE11/ReSA) — FAIR Principles for Resear · FORCE11 Software Citation Principles (Smith, Katz & Niemeyer, 2016, PeerJ CS 2:e86)
“U24HG007822”
The paper includes an award number (U24HG007822) from the National Institutes of Health, which is an alphanumeric grant identifier.
DataCite Metadata Schema 4.6 — 'FundingReference' property (funderName, funderIdentifier, award · Crossref Funder Registry — canonical funder identifiers for funding metadata · RDA-F2-01M — rich metadata provided to allow discovery (funding is part of the descriptive reco
Advisory · not in the published score
The paper does not name specific instruments, assays, or software used to produce the study's own data (the API is a service, not a dataset produced by a method). [majority verdict 'no' (3/5 passes agreed)]
RDA-R1.2-01M — 'Metadata includes provenance information according to community- specific standa · FsF-R1.2-01M — F-UJI: 'Metadata includes provenance information about data creation or generati · W3C PROV-O (W3C Recommendation, 2013) — the entity/activity/agent model of provenance
No documentation object (README, codebook, data dictionary) is named as travelling with the study's data; the API documentation is separate. [majority verdict 'no' (4/5 passes agreed)]
RDA-R1-01M — '(Meta)data are richly described with a plurality of accurate and relevant attribu · FsF-R1-01MD — F-UJI: 'Metadata specifies the content of the data' · NIH DMS Policy Element 3 (NOT-OD-21-014) — Standards (documentation and metadata to accompany t
Calibrated FAIR score — a parallel quality metric, independent of the DataRank citation score. See the full evaluation →
Base Score Contribution
0.756
From this paper's citation signal
Citation Network Contribution
0.472
From 30 citing papers with measurable signal
Ranked by each citer's contribution to N(p) — log1p(Cq) divided by its reference count — out of 100 citers.
National Institutes of Health
Grant: U24HG007822
National Institutes of Health
Grant: 5U24HG007822-12
UniProt: A Protein Sequence and Function Resource for Biomedical Science
NIGMS NIH HHS
National Institute of General Medical Sciences
National Institutes of Health
European Molecular Biology Laboratory
NIA NIH HHS
National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases
National Human Genome Research Institute
NCI NIH HHS
NIH HHS
NHLBI NIH HHS
National Cancer Institute
EMBL
National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute
National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases
National Institute on Aging
State Secretariat for Education, Research and Innovation
NIDDK NIH HHS
National Eye Institute
SERI
NEI NIH HHS
FWCI
63.25
Citation Percentile
1.0%
Citation Trend
Fields of Study
MeSH Terms
Keywords