The reproducibility crisis: where are we now and how can we progress?

Talking Techniques

In this episode I address the 'reproducibility crisis'. The concerning trend in the life sciences in which published papers and established principals are unable to be repeated by other researchers and, at times, even by the researchers who provided the initial results.

To do this I speak to two researchers driving forward reproducibility in the life sciences, Marc Raphael from the United States Naval Research Laboratory, and Elizabeth Iorns, CEO of Science Exchange. Marc discusses his recent trial of independent verification and validation (IV&V) labs in a live science setting, highlighting the lessons learned from the experience and exploring the differences observed in attitudes and approaches to reproducibility between the life sciences and engineering, where mark began his career.

Elizabeth discusses her work with Science Exchange and the reproducibility project: cancer biology. Elizabeth notes the key themes that have been exposed by the reproducibility project that are holding back the resolution of the crisis and explains what she thinks has worked so far in improving reproducibility.

This leads to a fascinating discussion between Marc and Elizabeth, comparing and contrasting their experiences and noting the different challenges that they face in trying to improve the state of research in the life sciences. In fact, their camaraderie was so strong that interviewing these two was a real treat and for lots of it, it was much better for me to sit back and watch as they debated a topic that they are both clearly very passionate about!

I hope you enjoy listening as much as I enjoyed recording this episode!

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The Talking Techniques podcast is hosted and produced by Tristan Free for BioTechniques. We would love to here more from our listeners about your opinions on the podcast, what you would like to hear more of and what you think we could do better!

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