How sharing instructions to build equipment increases global access to experimental research

What is it about?

Building and sharing one’s own research equipment has become easier because of the spread of tools such as 3D printing. Researchers are increasingly publishing equipment designs openly with the hope that their research can be replicated globally. However, there is little evidence for the effectiveness of different design approaches. This study provides evidence that open technologies indeed help access tools in low-resource environments and dissects the best design approaches for equipment to achieve this accessibility goal.

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Photo by Lars Kienle on Unsplash

Photo by Lars Kienle on Unsplash

Why is it important?

If open hardware follows in the footsteps of open software, it will radically change how research equipment is developed, produced, priced, and accessed – likely towards a more democratic, distributed, and appropriately priced model. However, as this emerging trend is developing, researchers and funders alike wonder if this ideal can be reached and what design criteria should be considered in developing research instrumentation for global accessibility. This study provides systematic evidence that open tools increase accessibility to research instrumentation and therefore justifies an increased focus on their development. This study also advances the discussion on design criteria by classifying different instrumentation design approaches and putting them into the context of researchers in low-resource environments. Classifying designs by accessibility clarifies that not all approaches that are currently popular are likely to lead to global accessibility. Criteria for improving the technological impact of open designs are proposed.

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