| Abstract |
Science means standing on the shoulders of others. The scientific method requires that data generated and method used is exactly recorded, transparent and available for re-use. Current data management practices in academic (food) laboratories do not allow for effective and efficient capture of data by individual researchers. As a result, there are inefficiencies in reusing data to verify, reproduce and build upon the existing experimental results. We want to know if the problem is rooted in individual motivational factors, technology or a combination of the both. For this, we need to understand academic lab research activities in terms of the way researchers keep a record of their experimental processes and also the way they re-use lab data and methods. Based on these findings, we propose set of interventions- combining individual incentives and technical tools- to promote effective and efficient data capture and re-use. We will evaluate our research methods by testing the developed tools among academic lab food researchers.
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