Science Forum: Improving preclinical studies through replications
- Department of Experimental Neurology, Charité–Universitätsmedizin, Germany
- BIH QUEST Center for Transforming Biomedical Research, Berlin Institute of Health, Germany
Figures
Figure 1
Increasing different forms of validity (internal, external and translational) during a preclinical research trajectory.
This schematic shows that internal validity (green line) is higher than external validity (orange) and translational validity (blue) at the start of a preclinical research trajectory (left), and that evidence from different types of experiments can increase different types of validity. For example, evidence from exploratory studies can increase internal and external validity, and evidence from between-lab replications can increase translational validity. C1, C2 and C3 are decision points where researchers can decide to refine the current experiment (yellow arrow), stop the trajectory (red arrow), or proceed to the next experiment (green arrow).
Tables
Table 1
Overview of three large-scale replication projects in biomedical research: Reproducibility Project: Cancer Biology (RPCB); Brazilian Reproducibility Initiative (BRI); Confirmatory Preclinical Studies (CPS).
| RPCB | BRI | CPS | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Selection of samples to be replicated | Main findings from 50 high impact citations/publications in cancer research | Replication of 60–100 experiments from research articles of Brazilian studies in different clinical areas | Two-step review process of proposals results in twelve projects |
| Selection of experiment | Main finding from published studies | Experiments using five pre-defined methods | Own experiments |
| Replicate own results | No | No | Yes |
| Exact Protocols | Yes (consulting original authors) | No | Yes |
| Blind to initial results | No | Yes | No |
| Pre-registration | Pre-registered study and individual Replication Protocols | Yes | Yes |
| Multi-site replication | No | Yes | Yes |
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Science Forum: Improving preclinical studies through replications
eLife 10:e62101.
https://doi.org/10.7554/eLife.62101
