Accomplishment and challenge of materials database toward big data

The history and current status of materials data activities from handbook to database are reviewed, with introduction to some important products. Through an example of prediction of interfacial thermal resistance based on data and data science methods, we show the advantages and potential of material informatics to study material issues which are too complicated or time consuming for conventional theoretical and experimental methods. Materials big data is the fundamental of material informatics. The challenges and strategy to construct materials big data are discussed, and some solutions are proposed as the results of our experiences to construct National Institute for Materials Science (NIMS) materials databases. (topical review)