Search
Enlarge Text | Printable Version | Sitemap | Contact us
Research
Upcoming events
Researcher Name: Sabina Leonelli Project Start Date: 01.10.2009 Project End Date: 30.12.2011 Contact Details: Sabina Leonelli Funder: ESRC and the British Academy Background: What does it mean for research to be based on empirical evidence? And for researchers to produce, disseminate and understand data? These questions, which have always been central to the philosophy of science, are being reformulated and reconsidered within contemporary biological and biomedical science. In these areas, technological innovation and shifting ideas about what counts as evidence have transformed current practices of data collection and sharing. Thanks to high-throughput technologies such as sequencing and micro-array analysis, the activity of data gathering has become increasing automated and technology-driven, resulting in the production of billions of data-points in need of a biological interpretation. Evidence-based medicine has fostered a similar attention shift to data collection within biomedical research, by placing data obtained through clinical trials at the top of the hierarchy of evidence. Massive research efforts are being devoted to the dissemination of data, in the hope that they can be used to generate new insights. Several commentators have argued that the extraction of knowledge from automatically generated data may constitute a new approach to scientific method, described as ‘data-driven’. Yet, there are no clear methodological guidelines for how researchers are supposed to use data available online towards new discoveries; nor how complex datasets can be integrated through cyberinfrastructures in ways that make them intelligible to and (re)usable by researchers. To help dealing with these key concerns, this project examines the characteristics of data-driven research and its significance for future research from the perspectives of philosophical, historical and social studies of science. The aim is to reach an understanding of how data collection and use affect the production of scientific knowledge, of how datasets should best be disseminated and visualised in order to stimulate discovery, and of the role played by theory and hypotheses in this process. If data-driven research constitutes a distinctive mode of knowledge production, how can it be characterised, and how innovative is it with respect to existing or past scientific practices? What is the role of theoretical assumptions and hypotheses within research practices that are currently referred to as data-driven, and what are the relationships more generally between data-driven and hypothesis-driven research? What are the problems encountered by data curators when assembling cyberinfrastructures, and how can they be solved to favor uptake and improved research practices by experimenters? Aims and Objectives: The project brings together a network of interested scholars with backgrounds in the natural sciences, the humanities and the social sciences. The aim is to bring together different forms of expertise to reach a better understanding of what data-driven science consists of, how it differs from other forms of knowledge-making and what implications this has for how we understand scientific research in the digital age. In addition to the research conducted by Sabina Leonelli, several events and grant proposals are under elaboration, and updates on events related to understanding data-intensive research can be obtained through this webpage or through a mailing list maintained by Sabina (write to her if interested in joining). Research Methods: Key Findings: Wider implications for policy: Project Update: An international workshop was held in Exeter on 15-16 April 2010: 'Data-driven research in the biological and biomedical sciences'. Also available is a report on the proceedings and outcomes. Several follow-up activities are being initiated as part of the project, in order to further the development of a research network on understandings of data-intensive science. The following events will be taking place at the University of Exeter in 2011: International workshop ‘Making It Big: Tracing Collaboration in the Life Sciences’: Reed Hall, University of Exeter. Co-organised by Sabina Leonelli, Gail Davies (UCL) and Emma Frow (EGN Forum), with funding by the EGN Genomics Forum. March 17-18, 2011. International Conference ‘Making Sense of Data: Who and How?’, co-sponsored by the Konrad Lorenz Institute and the ESRC Centre for Genomics in Society. Co-organised by Sabina Leonelli and Werner Callebaut. June 20-21, 2011. SPSP, 22-24 June 2011. This is the international, biannual meeting of the Society for the Philosophy of Science in Practice, where we plan to submit at least one symposium on theme of data-driven research. See call for papers and information on http://www.genomicsnetwork.ac.uk/egenis/events/conferences/title,23552,en.htmlThe project theme is also likely to figure prominently in the rest of the programme, particularly the plenary session organised by Egenis staff. Workshop ‘Data donation, use and publication in plant science’, co-sponsored by GARNet. Co-organised by Sabina Leonelli and Ruth Bastow. Date tba, 2011. Speakers will include several plant scientists, representatives of funding bodies and publishing houses, and social scientists from Egenis. Publications: A special issue of Studies in the History of the Biological and the Biomedical Sciences: Part C, edited by Sabina Leonelli and focusing on ‘Data-driven research in the biological and the biomedical sciences’, is in preparation. The issue will consist of 6 papers, including an introduction, and three discussion pieces. We expect it to be available in late 2011/early 2012. For advance viewing, read the abstracts from Studies special issue. In addition, the following publications are of relevance: Leonelli, S. When Humans are the Exception: Cross-Species Data Mining. Submitted. Leonelli, S. ‘Bio-Ontologies’. In: Werner Dubitzky, Olaf Wolkenhauer, Kwang-Hyun Cho, Hiroki Yokota (Eds.) Encyclopedia of System Biology . Springer. Leonelli, S. ‘Data-Intensiveness’. In: Werner Dubitzky, Olaf Wolkenhauer, Kwang-Hyun Cho, Hiroki Yokota (Eds.) Encyclopedia of System Biology . Springer. Leonelli, S. ‘Understanding Data In the Digital Age: or, the Experimental Context in Silico’. In preparation for submission. Bastow, R and Leonelli, S (forthcoming) Viable models for database funding: A review of available paths towards long-term sustainability for cyberinfrastructure. EMBO Reports. Leonelli, S. (2010) Documenting the Emergence of Bio-Ontologies: Or, Why Researching Bioinformatics Requires HPSSB. History and Philosophy of the Life Sciences, 32, 1: 105-126. Leonelli, S. (2010) Packaging Data for Re-Use: Databases in Model Organism Biology. In Howlett, P and Morgan, MS (eds) How Well Do ‘Facts’ Travel? The Dissemination of Reliable Knowledge. Cambridge University Press. Leonelli, S. (2010) The Commodification of Knowledge Exchange: Governing the Circulation of Biological Data. In: Radder, H (ed.) The Commodification of Academic Research: Science and the Modern University. Pittsburgh University Press. Leonelli, S. (2009) On the Locality of Data and Claims About Phenomena. Philosophy of Science 76 (5): 737-749. Leonelli, S. (2009) Centralising Labels to Distribute Data: The Regulatory Role of Genomic Consortia. In Atkinson, P., Glasner, P. and Lock, M. (eds.) The Handbook for Genetics and Society: Mapping the New Genomic Era. London: Routledge, pp. 469-485. External Links: Further information:
What does it mean for research to be based on empirical evidence? And for researchers to produce, disseminate and understand data? These questions, which have always been central to the philosophy of science, are being reformulated and reconsidered within contemporary biological and biomedical science. In these areas, technological innovation and shifting ideas about what counts as evidence have transformed current practices of data collection and sharing. Thanks to high-throughput technologies such as sequencing and micro-array analysis, the activity of data gathering has become increasing automated and technology-driven, resulting in the production of billions of data-points in need of a biological interpretation. Evidence-based medicine has fostered a similar attention shift to data collection within biomedical research, by placing data obtained through clinical trials at the top of the hierarchy of evidence. Massive research efforts are being devoted to the dissemination of data, in the hope that they can be used to generate new insights. Several commentators have argued that the extraction of knowledge from automatically generated data may constitute a new approach to scientific method, described as ‘data-driven’. Yet, there are no clear methodological guidelines for how researchers are supposed to use data available online towards new discoveries; nor how complex datasets can be integrated through cyberinfrastructures in ways that make them intelligible to and (re)usable by researchers.
To help dealing with these key concerns, this project examines the characteristics of data-driven research and its significance for future research from the perspectives of philosophical, historical and social studies of science. The aim is to reach an understanding of how data collection and use affect the production of scientific knowledge, of how datasets should best be disseminated and visualised in order to stimulate discovery, and of the role played by theory and hypotheses in this process. If data-driven research constitutes a distinctive mode of knowledge production, how can it be characterised, and how innovative is it with respect to existing or past scientific practices? What is the role of theoretical assumptions and hypotheses within research practices that are currently referred to as data-driven, and what are the relationships more generally between data-driven and hypothesis-driven research? What are the problems encountered by data curators when assembling cyberinfrastructures, and how can they be solved to favor uptake and improved research practices by experimenters?
The project brings together a network of interested scholars with backgrounds in the natural sciences, the humanities and the social sciences. The aim is to bring together different forms of expertise to reach a better understanding of what data-driven science consists of, how it differs from other forms of knowledge-making and what implications this has for how we understand scientific research in the digital age.
In addition to the research conducted by Sabina Leonelli, several events and grant proposals are under elaboration, and updates on events related to understanding data-intensive research can be obtained through this webpage or through a mailing list maintained by Sabina (write to her if interested in joining).
An international workshop was held in Exeter on 15-16 April 2010: 'Data-driven research in the biological and biomedical sciences'. Also available is a report on the proceedings and outcomes.
Several follow-up activities are being initiated as part of the project, in order to further the development of a research network on understandings of data-intensive science. The following events will be taking place at the University of Exeter in 2011:
A special issue of Studies in the History of the Biological and the Biomedical Sciences: Part C, edited by Sabina Leonelli and focusing on ‘Data-driven research in the biological and the biomedical sciences’, is in preparation. The issue will consist of 6 papers, including an introduction, and three discussion pieces. We expect it to be available in late 2011/early 2012. For advance viewing, read the abstracts from Studies special issue.
In addition, the following publications are of relevance:
Leonelli, S. When Humans are the Exception: Cross-Species Data Mining. Submitted.
Leonelli, S. ‘Bio-Ontologies’. In: Werner Dubitzky, Olaf Wolkenhauer, Kwang-Hyun Cho, Hiroki Yokota (Eds.) Encyclopedia of System Biology . Springer.
Leonelli, S. ‘Data-Intensiveness’. In: Werner Dubitzky, Olaf Wolkenhauer, Kwang-Hyun Cho, Hiroki Yokota (Eds.) Encyclopedia of System Biology . Springer.
Leonelli, S. ‘Understanding Data In the Digital Age: or, the Experimental Context in Silico’. In preparation for submission.
Bastow, R and Leonelli, S (forthcoming) Viable models for database funding: A review of available paths towards long-term sustainability for cyberinfrastructure. EMBO Reports.
Leonelli, S. (2010) Documenting the Emergence of Bio-Ontologies: Or, Why Researching Bioinformatics Requires HPSSB. History and Philosophy of the Life Sciences, 32, 1: 105-126.
Leonelli, S. (2010) Packaging Data for Re-Use: Databases in Model Organism Biology. In Howlett, P and Morgan, MS (eds) How Well Do ‘Facts’ Travel? The Dissemination of Reliable Knowledge. Cambridge University Press.
Leonelli, S. (2010) The Commodification of Knowledge Exchange: Governing the Circulation of Biological Data. In: Radder, H (ed.) The Commodification of Academic Research: Science and the Modern University. Pittsburgh University Press. Leonelli, S. (2009) On the Locality of Data and Claims About Phenomena. Philosophy of Science 76 (5): 737-749. Leonelli, S. (2009) Centralising Labels to Distribute Data: The Regulatory Role of Genomic Consortia. In Atkinson, P., Glasner, P. and Lock, M. (eds.) The Handbook for Genetics and Society: Mapping the New Genomic Era. London: Routledge, pp. 469-485.
Leonelli, S. (2009) On the Locality of Data and Claims About Phenomena. Philosophy of Science 76 (5): 737-749.
Leonelli, S. (2009) Centralising Labels to Distribute Data: The Regulatory Role of Genomic Consortia. In Atkinson, P., Glasner, P. and Lock, M. (eds.) The Handbook for Genetics and Society: Mapping the New Genomic Era. London: Routledge, pp. 469-485.
