Today, Science and several of its sister journals published a joint special issue on managing the increasingly huge influx of research data, a common problem across many different research disciplines. The articles in the collection, which are provided free of charge to all readers, highlight the opportunities that can be realized  when this tsunami of scientific data is organized and can be accessed, as well as the challenges and barriers encountered along the way. For a neuroinformatics perspective, we particularly recommend the article on mining neuroscience data, written by Huda Akil, Maryann Martone and David Van Essen.