Entity types
ArkID assigns durable identifiers to the core entities of research and innovation, including ideas, people, organizations, projects, funding opportunities, outputs, and products.
Documentation
ArkID Documentation
Everything you need to work with ArkID, the open identity infrastructure for research and innovation.
This documentation covers the identifier model, relationship model, schema guides, integrations, APIs, and governance foundations.
Public Preview — documentation reflects current capabilities and clearly labeled roadmap items.
Getting started
Start With the Core Model
If you are new to ArkID, begin with these three concepts before exploring schemas and APIs.
Relationships
ArkID models how those entities connect over time, including affiliations, authorship, participation, stewardship, and funding relationships.
Resolution
Every ArkID resolves to a public URL, giving each entity a stable, human-readable reference point across systems.
Use the documentation site to understand the model. Use GitHub for the most current technical references and implementation details.
Identifier model
ArkID Types and Format
ArkID provides six standardized identifier types with entity-specific prefixes.
Idea IDs
ARKI-0000-0000-1122-3344
People IDs
ARKU-0000-0000-2783-9273
Project IDs
ARKP-0000-0000-3943-2198
Organization IDs
ARKO-0000-0000-5129-3847
Output IDs
ARKD-0000-0000-6677-8899
Funding IDs
ARKF-0000-0000-1234-567X
Each ArkID contains a numeric value with an entity-type prefix and a built-in check digit for validation. The public resolver is available at:
https://arkid.researchark.eu/{arkid}Interoperability
Built to Work With the Wider Research Stack
ArkID is designed to interoperate with the systems research and innovation teams already use.
Researcher and organizational identity
ORCID for researcher identity and ROR for organization identity are primary integration targets, enabling cross-system disambiguation of people and institutions.
Publication and output infrastructure
DOI and DataCite infrastructure for outputs and resources, and Crossref and related scholarly metadata systems for publication-level interoperability.
Authentication and federation
Institutional identity systems for authentication and federation, including OpenID Connect and OAuth 2.0 support.
Cross-system portability
ArkID is designed to sit alongside existing identifiers rather than replace them, making identity portable and resolvable across systems and platforms.
ArkID is not designed to trap identity in one platform. It is designed to make identity portable, resolvable, and useful across systems.
Verification and trust
Identity With Provenance
Current capabilities
Organization and user verification workflows
Public resolver visibility controls
Relationship tracking across entities and roles
Audit-ready identity and provenance foundations
Roadmap
Roadmap items describe planned capability, not production availability.
W3C Verifiable Credentials
Expanded trust and verification workflows
Additional federation and ecosystem integrations
Schema reference
Explore the Schema Guides
Each schema guide explains core fields, validation logic, ecosystem alignment, and recommended usage patterns.
Governance and privacy
Open and Sovereign Foundations
Governance
ArkID is currently stewarded by Mycel UG (haftungsbeschränkt), with a longer-term direction toward broader community governance.
Privacy and sovereignty
EU-based hosting, granular public visibility controls, GDPR-aligned data handling, and a public resolver design that omits non-public sections automatically.
Open-source
ArkID is developed as open infrastructure under Apache 2.0 licensing, designed to serve a global research and innovation community.
Get started
Ready to Work With ArkID?
Create your ArkID and establish durable, interoperable identity across the research and innovation ecosystem.