TY - JOUR T1 - Reproducibility and replicability of rodent phenotyping in preclinical studies JF - bioRxiv DO - 10.1101/079350 SP - 079350 AU - Neri Kafkafi AU - Joseph Agassi AU - Elissa J. Chesler AU - John C. Crabbe AU - Wim E. Crusio AU - David Eilam AU - Robert Gerlai AU - Ilan Golani AU - Alex Gomez-Marin AU - Ruth Heller AU - Fuad Iraqi AU - Iman Jaljuli AU - Natasha A. Karp AU - Hugh Morgan AU - George Nicholson AU - Donald W. Pfaff AU - S. Helene Richter AU - Philip B. Stark AU - Oliver Stiedl AU - Victoria Stodden AU - Lisa M. Tarantino AU - Valter Tucci AU - William Valdar AU - Robert W. Williams AU - Hanno Würbel AU - Yoav Benjamini Y1 - 2016/01/01 UR - http://biorxiv.org/content/early/2016/10/17/079350.abstract N2 - The scientific community is increasingly concerned with cases of published “discoveries” that are not replicated in further studies. The field of mouse behavioral phenotyping was one of the first to raise this concern, and to relate it to other complicated methodological issues: the complex interaction between genotype and environment; the definitions of behavioral constructs; and the use of the mouse as a model animal for human health and disease mechanisms. In January 2015, researchers from various disciplines including genetics, behavior genetics, neuroscience, ethology, statistics and bioinformatics gathered in Tel Aviv University to discuss these issues. The general consent presented here was that the issue is prevalent and of concern, and should be addressed at the statistical, methodological and policy levels, but is not so severe as to call into question the validity and the usefulness of model organisms as a whole. Well-organized community efforts, coupled with improved data and metadata sharing, were agreed by all to have a key role to play in identifying specific problems and promoting effective solutions. As replicability is related to validity and may also affect generalizability and translation of findings, the implications of the present discussion reach far beyond the issue of replicability of mouse phenotypes but may be highly relevant throughout biomedical research. ER -