# Brain Imaging Data Structure **Domain:** Neuroinformatics / Data Standards **Doc Type:** Technical Standard Node **Maturity:** Community Standard in Active Use **Related:** [[BIDS-EEG]], [[Neurodata Without Borders]], [[Neural Data Provenance]], [[Functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging]] --- ## Definition The **Brain Imaging Data Structure (BIDS)** is a community standard for organizing and describing neuroscience datasets through directory structure, naming conventions, tabular event data, and machine-readable metadata. It supports multiple imaging and electrophysiology modalities and an extension process for new domains. ## Architectural role BIDS organizes studies across subjects and sessions so that data can be validated, shared, reused, and processed by common applications. It preserves research intelligibility rather than attempting to encode a complete person. ## Primary source - [BIDS Specification 1.10.1](https://bids-specification.readthedocs.io/en/v1.10.1/)