Involving a diversity of labs and conditions in scientific experiments using animals – rather than one single setting – could improve study reproducibility as well as reduce the overall number of animals used, Bern researchers have found. Traditionally, scientists conduct experiments in highly standardised experimental settings to enhance reproducibility – i.e., to make it easier for other scientists to check their results by repeating the same experiment under the same conditions. But a study published on Thursday in the journal PLOS Biology, led by researchers from the University of Bern, found that this approach tends to yield results that only apply under those same, specific set of circumstances. The authors propose that including multiple laboratories in scientific experiments could not only improve the reproducibility of the results, but also lead to fewer animals being needed for research overall by reducing the number of inconclusive experiments. The researchers came to ...
