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A new ecosystem for evidence synthesis

Nature Ecology & Evolution volume 4, pages 498–501 (2020)Cite this article

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Synthesizing evidence is an essential part of scientific progress, but it is often done in a slow and uncoordinated manner, sometimes producing misleading conclusions. Here, we propose the idea of an ‘open synthesis community’ to resolve this pressing issue.

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Fig. 1: Open synthesis community.

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Acknowledgements

Evidence Synthesis Hackathon 2019 was supported by the Faculty of Science at UNSW Sydney, Fenner School of Environment & Society at the Australian National University, Stockholm Environment Institute and University of Johannesburg. A.S.-T. was partially funded by the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG, German Research Foundation) - Projektnummer 316099922 - TRR 212.

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Evolution & Ecology Research Centre, School of Biological, Earth and Environmental Sciences, University of New South Wales, Sydney, New South Wales, Australia

    Shinichi Nakagawa, Malgorzata Lagisz, Rose E. O’Dea, Yong Zhi Foo & Fonti Kar

  2. Discipline of Biomedical Informatics and Digital Health, School of Medical Sciences, Faculty of Medicine and Health, The University of Sydney, Sydney, New South Wales, Australia

    Adam G. Dunn

  3. Centre for Health Informatics, Macquarie University, Sydney, New South Wales, Australia

    Adam G. Dunn & Paige Martin

  4. Institute for Evidence-Based Healthcare, Bond University, Gold Coast, Queensland, Australia

    Alexandra Bannach-Brown & Matthew Carter

  5. Department of Ecology & Evolutionary Biology, University of Connecticut, Storrs, CT, USA

    Eliza M. Grames

  6. Department of Evolutionary Biology, Bielefeld University, Bielefeld, Germany

    Alfredo Sánchez-Tójar

  7. Division of Ecology and Evolution, Research School of Biology, The Australian National University, Canberra, Australian Capital Territory, Australia

    Daniel W. A. Noble, Pieter A. Arnold, Eve Cooper & Sonya R. Geange

  8. Fenner School of Environment & Society, The Australian National University, Canberra, Australian Capital Territory, Australia

    Martin J. Westgate & Claudia Munera

  9. Australian Academy of Science, Canberra, Australian Capital Territory, Australia

    Stuart Barrow

  10. College of Medicine and Health, University of Exeter, Exeter, UK

    Alison Bethel

  11. Department of Psychological Sciences, Institute for Collaboration on Health, Intervention, and Policy, University of Connecticut, Storrs, CT, USA

    Emily Hennessy

  12. Centre for Health Policy, School of Public Health, University of Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, South Africa

    Witness Mapanga

  13. School of Mathematical Sciences, Queensland University of Technology, Brisbane, Queensland, Australia

    Kerrie Mengersen

  14. School of Public Health and Preventive Medicine, Monash University, Melbourne, Victoria, Australia

    Matthew J. Page

  15. Campbell Collaboration, Oslo, Norway

    Vivian Welch

  16. Stockholm Environment Institute, Stockholm, Sweden

    Neal R. Haddaway

  17. Africa Centre for Evidence, University of Johannesburg, Johannesburg, South Africa

    Neal R. Haddaway

  18. National Centre for Epidemiology and Population Health, Research School of Population Health, The Australian National University, Canberra, Australian Capital Territory, Australia

    Owen Forbes & Luis Furuya-Kanamori

  19. Department of Mathematics and Statistics, School of Engineering and Mathematical Sciences, La Trobe University, Melbourne, Victoria, Australia

    Charles T. Gray

  20. Psychological Sciences, University of California, Merced, CA, USA

    W. Kyle Hamilton

  21. School of Psychology, Deakin University, Melbourne, Victoria, Australia

    Emily Kothe

  22. United Nations Population Funds Asia and the Pacific Regional Office, Hong Kong, Hong Kong

    Joey Kwong

  23. Department of Population Health Sciences, Bristol Medical School, Bristol, UK

    Luke A. McGuinness

  24. South African Department of Planning, Monitoring, and Evaluation, Pretoria, South Africa

    Mandlenkosi Ngwenya

  25. Digital Solution Foundry, Johannesburg, South Africa

    Christopher Penkin

  26. Epistemonikos Foundation, Santiago, Chile

    Daniel Perez & Juan Vásquez

  27. Department of Information Systems & Analytics, Santa Clara University, Santa Clara, CA, USA

    Michael Schermann

  28. School of Life and Environmental Sciences, The University of Sydney, Sydney, New South Wales, Australia

    Alistair M. Senior & Thomas E. White

  29. Department of Psychiatry and Neuropsychology, School for Mental Health and Neuroscience, Maastricht University, Maastricht, The Netherlands

    Wolfgang Viechtbauer

  30. School of Art and Design, The Australian National University, Canberra, Australian Capital Territory, Australia

    Mitchell Whitelaw

Authors
  1. Shinichi Nakagawa
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  2. Adam G. Dunn
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  3. Malgorzata Lagisz
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  4. Alexandra Bannach-Brown
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  5. Eliza M. Grames
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  6. Alfredo Sánchez-Tójar
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  7. Rose E. O’Dea
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  8. Daniel W. A. Noble
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  9. Martin J. Westgate
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  10. Pieter A. Arnold
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  11. Stuart Barrow
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  12. Alison Bethel
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  13. Eve Cooper
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  14. Yong Zhi Foo
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  15. Sonya R. Geange
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  16. Emily Hennessy
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  17. Witness Mapanga
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  18. Kerrie Mengersen
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  19. Claudia Munera
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  20. Matthew J. Page
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  21. Vivian Welch
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  22. Neal R. Haddaway
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Consortia

Evidence Synthesis Hackathon 2019 Participants

  • Matthew Carter
  • , Owen Forbes
  • , Luis Furuya-Kanamori
  • , Charles T. Gray
  • , W. Kyle Hamilton
  • , Fonti Kar
  • , Emily Kothe
  • , Joey Kwong
  • , Luke A. McGuinness
  • , Paige Martin
  • , Mandlenkosi Ngwenya
  • , Christopher Penkin
  • , Daniel Perez
  • , Michael Schermann
  • , Alistair M. Senior
  • , Juan Vásquez
  • , Wolfgang Viechtbauer
  • , Thomas E. White
  •  & Mitchell Whitelaw

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Shinichi Nakagawa.

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The authors declare no competing interests.

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Nakagawa, S., Dunn, A.G., Lagisz, M. et al. A new ecosystem for evidence synthesis. Nat Ecol Evol 4, 498–501 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41559-020-1153-2

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