Assignment: Support scientists in using the right method
Elsevier Science is one of the largest publisher of methods-related content for life scientists. Over 19 journals and book series cover a range of topics in Biology and Chemistry. Finding the right method for an experiment and adapting it to fit their needs can take scientists hours or even days. Recognizing the specific painpoints of lab scientist, Elsevier set out to develop a product which makes it easier to find and apply the right methods.
In addition to solving the current needs of lab scientists the second goal of the product is to remove traditional boundaries between scientific fields.This will enable for example cell biologists to discover methods in biochemistry, biochemists to find methods in molecular biology and neuroscientists to apply methods in biophysics.
For these ambitious goals all 40.000 articles and 120 custom-made protocols are mapped against a web of over 60.000 expert topics from different domains. This approach both offers an easy way to search the current methods and offers novel ways to discover related ones.
Method: User Centered Design and Prototyping
The project was innovative because of the expert taxonomies and data-mining that were used. A lot of work went into getting all the data and technical details sorted out. This work was done with specialist partners such as Arity, Elsevier’s IT organization, and Elsevier Labs. With this strong focus on technology and data a big challenge for the project was keeping the user needs in the foreground.
The end product would need to support the workflow of specialist scientists and the subject matter was impossible to gasp for outsiders. This made it even more essential to involve end users. User research was conducted in every stage of the process; preliminary research, concept testing, testing on a prototype and beta testing of the real product.
The interaction design deliverables (flows and wireframes), the visual design and the prototype were also used to aid discussions in the project team which was distributed over the Netherlands office of the Elsevier's UCD group, Greece, UK, India and the US. Together with the visual design of CleverFranke, one of our business partners, the prototype that was initially built for user testing became a deliverable for the developers.
Result: new product supporting current needs and innovation
Methods Navigator launched april 11th 2011 as part of the Navigator Suite and has been attracting attention in the field. It offers easy access to more methods than any other source available today.
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