Linking Marine Research and Open Science: PHAROS Presented at UARN Meeting

• May 20, 2025

At the start of April, Prof. Pavel Gol’din, leading researcher at the I.I. Schmalhausen Institute of Zoology of the National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine and a member of the PHAROS project team, participated in a meeting of the Ukrainian Reproducibility Network (UARN). UARN is coordinated by Dr. Oleksandr Berezko of Lviv Polytechnic National University, who is also part of the PHAROS team.

UARN is a newly established, peer-led national consortium dedicated to enhancing research quality in Ukraine. Its mission is to promote, support, and investigate factors that contribute to robust scientific practices, including reproducibility, replicability, and Open Science. The network serves as a platform for interdisciplinary collaboration, connecting researchers to exchange ideas and share best practices.

A key area of shared interest between PHAROS and UARN is citizen science. Research conducted with the involvement of the general public, including amateur and nonprofessional participants. Citizen science is especially valuable in fields like ecology, biology, and conservation, where it enables broader data collection and community engagement in critical scientific work.

The PHAROS project is working to establish a Living Lab in the Danube Delta region, spanning Ukraine and Romania. This lab addresses challenges related to marine biodiversity, the impact of introduced species on marine mammals, and marine pollution. It actively involves local communities, fishing groups, and environmental NGOs. A central tool in this effort is the MINKA platform, which supports the participation of citizen scientists in tracking species across the region.

At the UARN meeting, Prof. Gol’din presented citizen science initiatives within PHAROS, highlighting their role as a form of distributed social data collection. His talk sparked a lively discussion on improving the reproducibility of research in biology and life sciences. Inspired by PHAROS, the UARN team now plans to develop open educational resources on best practices in Open and Reproducible Science in biology, using the PHAROS experience with MINKA as a case study.

Written by Dr. Oleksandr Berezko