Three weeks in Grenoble
Meeting my co-supervisor and learning to use ASReview
After the ENEOLI Training School in Lisbon, I am spending three weeks in Grenoble for a research and training stay connected with my doctoral project. The visit is especially significant because it is my first opportunity to meet my co-supervisor, Olivier Kraif, in person.
Although Olivier and I have been working together remotely, meeting in Grenoble makes it possible to discuss the project in greater depth and to work through methodological questions more naturally. Our conversations are helping me clarify several aspects of the scoping review and think more concretely about the computational components of the thesis. They are also opening new directions for our longer-term collaboration.
The final week of the stay is devoted to an online course offered by Utrecht University on AI-aided systematic reviewing. I am following the course from Grenoble and learning to use ASReview, an open-source tool that combines active learning with human screening decisions to prioritize records during evidence synthesis.
This training comes at an ideal point in the project. The searches for my scoping review have produced tens of thousands of potentially relevant records, making an efficient and transparent screening strategy essential. Over five intensive days, the course covers the principles behind active learning, the practical use of ASReview and the methodological decisions involved in integrating machine-assisted screening into a review.
The stay has also provided time to discover Grenoble and its surroundings. Olivier has introduced me not only to colleagues and research environments at Université Grenoble Alpes, but also to places such as the Charmant Som and the oak of Venon. These excursions have made the visit both scientifically productive and personally memorable.
The three weeks have confirmed the value of spending time in the same place as one’s collaborators. I am leaving Grenoble with a stronger methodological foundation for the review, several new research ideas and a much more concrete sense of the collaboration that Olivier and I are building around the thesis.