diff --git a/pipeline/src/collection.py b/pipeline/src/collection.py
index 123d51f8..11dfa7df 100644
--- a/pipeline/src/collection.py
+++ b/pipeline/src/collection.py
@@ -220,3 +220,29 @@ def validate(self, ignore=None):
     def is_valid(self):
         failures = self.validate()
         return len(failures) == 0
+
+    def sort_nodes_for_upload(self):
+        """
+        Return a list of nodes, sorted so that they can be uploaded to a graph database safely,
+        i.e., child nodes will be saved before their parents.
+
+        The upload code is assumed to generate @ids and update the Python instances accordingly.
+        """
+        unsorted = set(self.nodes.keys())
+        sorted = []
+        # initial step: move nodes with no children (downstream links) directly to `sorted`
+        for node_id in unsorted:
+            if len(self.nodes[node_id].links) == 0:
+                sorted.append(node_id)
+        unsorted -= set(sorted)
+        # now iteratively add nodes to `sorted` if all their children are already in `sorted`
+        while len(unsorted) > 0:
+            newly_sorted = []
+            for node_id in unsorted:
+                child_ids = set(child.id for child in self.nodes[node_id].links)
+                if not child_ids.difference(sorted):
+                    sorted.append(node_id)
+                    newly_sorted.append(node_id)
+            unsorted -= set(newly_sorted)
+        return [self.nodes[node_id] for node_id in sorted]
+        
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