TRACE: TRAnsparency CErtified

Building trust in computational research through certification

Funding: Sloan-G-2026-79586 NSF-2209628 NSF-2209629 NSF-2209630
TRACE: TRAnsparency CErtified

Project Overview

The TRACE (TRAnsparency CErtified) project is developing a new approach to computational transparency and reproducibility in research. Rather than requiring consumers of research to repeat computations to verify results, TRACE enables trust through certifying the successful original execution of a computational workflow that produced findings in situ.

The Problem

Research communities across the sciences increasingly require that authors share the data, code, and methods used to obtain computational results. However, without verification by repeating computations, there is no guarantee that provided artifacts are complete or can actually be used to produce reported results.

Particularly problematic are studies that employ:

  • Sensitive or proprietary data for which access and reuse are restricted
  • Streaming, transient, or ephemeral data that cannot be used to verify reproducibility due to their dynamic nature
  • Very large-scale or specialized computational resources available only to authorized users

In these cases, verification by repeating computations may not be possible.

The Solution

TRACE is a model of certified transparency whereby the original execution of a computational workflow is certified by the system on which it was run. With certifications in hand, consumers of research can trust the transparency of results without necessarily repeating computations.

Key Components

The TRACE project includes:

  • Technical specifications for describing and certifying research artifacts
  • Reusable software tools for implementing certification systems
  • Pilot website for demonstrating TRACE approach and actively providing certified reproducible artifacts
  • Support for HPC environments (SLURM clusters and other high-performance computing systems)

Funding

The project is currently (2026-2028) supported through funding from the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation under award G-2026-79586.

The original concept were developed with National Science Foundation funding::

Collaborating Institutions

  • University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
  • Cornell University
  • University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill (original grant)

References