The February caption contest featured a cartoon showing a lab shared by two researchers. One side of the lab is in complete disarray with broken glassware, spills of various unknown liquids, and broken equipment. The other side of the lab is highly organized and in sparkling condition.
The winning caption for the February contest was “Don't Forget to Clean Your Dirty Data!,” written by Jennifer Ann Morrow from University of Tennessee. Jennifer’s caption provides a nice avenue for facilitating discussions of the importance of having a plan to clean dirty/messy data.
Honorable mentions this month go to Laila Poisson from the Ford Health System for her caption “As goes the lab, so go the data,” for its emphasis on the importance of gathering data in a way that avoids dirty/messy data; and to Chantal Larose from Eastern Connecticut State University for her caption “Cleanliness is next to reproducibility!,” for making the link from an organized workflow to the important topic of reproducibility of results.