Standard Grant: A Case Study of How Re-Situation of Scientific Knowledge from Human Population Genomics Works

该奖项支持一项研究项目，以产生他人实际使用科学研究产品的知识；它将提供有关科学知识对象（如数据和模型）如何进入其他环境并重新定位的见解。对于一个领域的科学发现被其他领域的研究人员实际应用的一般和具体过程，以及被其他更广泛的领域的研究人员应用的过程，人们知之甚少。该项目侧重于人类基因组学领域的知识。研究人员将在两个研究型大学实验室开展一项关于恢复人类种群基因组学知识的案例研究。该项目将从STS和生命科学的角度提供见解和建议，如何促进生命科学家与他们研究的个人和社区之间的合作，以及这些科学家与其他关注种族、民族、身份和健康问题的利益相关者之间的合作。本研究项目的目的是促进理解人类基因组学领域的各种知识对象（模型、数据集、发现和软件）如何被其他受众（包括其他领域的科学家、研究中所代表的人群）以及通过各种媒体所参与。研究人员将结合民族志田野调查、档案研究、概念跟踪、引文分析和主题建模方法，详细描述科学家如何在工作流程中生产、使用和重用各种科学知识对象。这是一个及时而重要的案例研究；人口基因组学领域正在因其对假设驱动和大数据方法的加强使用而重塑，其结果影响着全球比较生物医学研究、包容和获得保健服务的政策，以及作为患者和基因组数据消费者的集体和个人身份认同过程，这些过程适用或质疑关于自己的发现。该奖项反映了美国国家科学基金会的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

This award supports a research project to generate knowledge of the actual use of the products of scientific research by others; it will provide insights concerning how objects of scientific knowledge, such as data and models, travel to other contexts and become re-situated. Remarkably little is known about the general and specific processes by which scientific findings from one field are actually used by researchers in other fields, and by others more generally. The project focuses on knowledge from the field of human population genomics. The researchers will develop a case study of resituating knowledge from human population genomics that focuses on two research university laboratories. The project will offer insight and recommendations from both STS and life-sciences perspectives on how to foster collaboration between life scientists and the individuals and communities they study, and between these and other stakeholders concerned with issues of race, ethnicity, identity, and health. The aim of this research project is to advance understanding how various objects of knowledge (models, datasets, findings, and software) in one field, human population genomics, are engaged by other audiences including scientists in other fields, the populations represented in the studies, and through various media. The researchers will use a combination of ethnographic fieldwork, archival study, concept tracking, citation analysis, and topic modeling methods to develop a detailed mechanistic account of how scientists produce, use and reuse in their workflows a variety of objects of scientific knowledge. This is a timely and important case study; the field of human population genomics is being reshaped by its enhanced use of hypothesis-driven and big data approaches, and its results influence global comparative biomedical research, policies of inclusion and access to health services, and collective and individual identity processes as patients and genomic data consumers appropriate or contest findings about themselves.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.