The Brazilian Reproducibility Initiative is approaching its most important moment: the beginning of the replication experiments. Our current task is to select the experiments: 20 for each of the three methods selected for our first wave – RT-PCR, MTT assay and elevated plus maze. To accomplish that, we are analyzing a sample of 15,000 Brazilian articles, to select representative experiments to start the replications in the second semester.
With the funding for the whole project secured by the Serrapilheira Institute, we already have 61 laboratories confirmed to participate in the first wave of experiments (to get to know them better, you can check our collaborator map). On March 13th we had our first online meeting with all participants, which was streamed in real time through our partnership with Rede de Pesquisadores and is now available on YouTube.
Our partners at Rede will also organize a series of monthly webinars starting in April. The idea is to bring world-class researchers in the fields of reproducibility and metascience to present their views on the subject and discuss it with our collaborators. These events will also be streamed and open to everyone, and we will soon be providing a more detailed calendar.
Lastly, our visibility keeps growing: the Initiative has been featured by Brazilian newspapers such as Folha de S. Paulo and Nexo (both in Portuguese), highlighting the importance of robust science and the support of the Serrapilheira Institute for the project. We have also just published a feature article in eLife with a overview of the project.
To keep up with the project’s news, you can also follow us on Facebook (in Portuguese) or Twitter (in English)! To get in touch with us, our email is reprodutibilidade.br@gmail.com