By SORTEE | February 28, 2022
[SORTEE member voices is a weekly Q&A with a different SORTEE member]
Name: Matt Grainger.
Date: 05 July 2021.
Position: Researcher.
Research and/or work interests: I am an applied ecologist interested in how we use knowledge to better inform decision making in species conservation. I have a strong interest in developing tools that help people gather information in robust and transparent ways, interact with that information and make inference from it. I currently work on several projects that are fundamentally about how we make open research approaches (i.e. sharing data, sharing code, sharing best practice) as an integrated part of the workflow for biodiversity researchers and how we can take this open research and use it to help decision-makers find optimal solutions..
What’s an open science practice or topic that you’ve changed your views on within the last few years? Why?
Often ecologists, conservation scientists think that our science is unique in the challenges that it faces with open science. Interacting with evidence synthesis methodologists and open science/metascience researchers in the last few years has taught me that we face many of the same challenges as other disciplines. An obvious example is sharing data which are sensitive (locations of threatened species for example) which has been discussed widely by the medical sciences (e.g. participant data). We are not unique and we face the same challenges that other disciplines do; this means we can learn from the solutions that they have put forward, adapt them and save ourselves many more years of wasted research.
Where were you born and raised?
I was born on an Army base in the South East of England. My family moved every two years to a new army base somewhere in the world. We were lucky to live in a variety of countries including Bahrain and Australia. Living in these countries exposed me to a variety of wildlife; walking to and from school in Australia was an adventure - amazing birds, insects and snakes everywhere you looked (it sometimes took me a while to actually get to school). My passion for wildlife was further enhanced by annual visits to family in South Africa - a part of the world that always feels like home to me. The travel bug continues to bite me - although now I try to stay in one spot longer than 2 years (that has not been going too well recently, but we can hope for the future).
Where to find you online?:
Twitter: @Ed_pheasant
