On neuroinformatics.

In the emerging field of cognitive sciences neuroinformatics is getting more and more important for both computational as analytical purposes. For the first time in the history of cognitive sciences, computers are regarded as crucial elements for the progress of our neural research charged with the task of finding patterns in the rapidly growing data sets. Informatics in neurosciences cover a wide variety of tools, ranging from molecular to behavioral analysis. Metaneva targets behavioral functions using its paradigm-based analytical tools.

On the data in the different data warehouses.

The power of the IT tools depends on the data in the particular warehouse. The lack of standards for data reports complicates both storage and data input. Despite attempts to construct good data storage engines or sophisticated text mining of such data reports, we still are faced with semantic reports of numerical data. This implicates that cognitive experiments and temporary conclusions regarding neural systems all depend on the validity of semantic organization of such data sets.

Efforts are made to counter the variety of concepts and vocabulary (BrainML, Neuronames,..). Metaneva tries to be as compliant as possible with these repositories.

On computing the brain.

Current tools and research data warehouses such as web based databases ( e.g. ISI or Pubmed), have limited query option. They rely on articles as reported in journals, using semantics as the relevant search criteria . These translated data (from neural numerical data to semantic descriptive data) does not allow a detailed query on the level of experimental setup. Yet, a detailed analysis and computing neural networks needs more then vague paradigm settings and conclusive remarks. Cognitive sciences requires a continuous re-analysis of current data sets, using detailed information to compute dynamic neural networks (cf. many-to-many relations).

On Metaneva...

Metaneva is one of those projects aiming to structure and analyze the data, using a novel approach to the data sets. Our novel approach lies in the fact that we both envision the cognitive scientist who needs a tool to pre-evaluate a future experiment and the cognitive scientist who works on a meta-analysis of the neural mechanisms. The developers of Metaneva consider the spreading of such fundamental knowledge as a core activity, hence welcoming the evolution towards a community-based team.

We consider this tool as a contribution to the cognitive sciences and society as a whole. Such a community driven tool has value since it combines expertise from various resources, and at the same time allows the tool to serve the further development of the cognitive sciences as a whole.