Linking Labs: Interconnecting Experimental Environments

Abstract

We introduce the concept of LabLinking: a technology-based interconnection of experimental laboratories across institutions, disciplines, cultures, languages, and time zones - in other words experiments without borders. In particular, we introduce LabLinking levels (LLL), which define the degree of tightness of empirical interconnection between labs. We describe the technological infrastructure in terms of hard- and software required for the respective LLLs and present examples of linked laboratories along with insights about the challenges and benefits. In sum, we argue that linked labs provide a unique platform for a continuous exchange between scientists and experimenters, thereby enabling a time synchronous execution of experiments performed with and by decentralized user and researchers, improving outreach and ease of subject recruitment, allowing to establish new experimental designs and to incorporate a panoply of complementary biosensors, devices, hard- and software solutions.

EEG Correlates of Distractions and Hesitations in Human–Robot Interaction: A LabLinking Pilot Study

“…To overcome this issue, we employ the LabLinking paradigm [18] for our experiment, depicted in Figure 1. In this paradigm for experimental research, it is possible for the robot Pepper to remain at its usual location at Bielefeld University while interacting in real-time with a human participant at the BioSignals Lab at the University of Bremen.…”

“…Through a shallow grid search, we obtained optimized results for all participants with a parameter setting of 500 trees, a maximum tree depth of 10, a minimum sample split of 3, and a minimum of 4 samples per leaf. Further, a combination of all features from the delta (1-4 Hz), theta (4-8 Hz), alpha (8-12 Hz), low beta (12)(13)(14)(15)(16)(17)(18)(19)(20), and high beta (20-30 Hz) bands binned in 2 Hz led to the optimal performance for 4-12 Hz in the first classification task (ambient vs. distraction) and for 4-20 Hz in the second classification (distraction vs. hesitation), and 62 × 5 = 310 and 62 × 9 = 558 dimensional feature vectors, respectively.…”

“…LabLinking is a technology-based interconnection of experimental laboratories with a defined level of connection tightness (LabLinking Level-LLL) [18]. We argue that linked labs provide a unique platform for a continuous exchange between scientists and experimenters, thereby enabling a time-synchronous execution of experiments performed with and by decentralized users and researchers, improving the outreach and ease of human participant recruitment, allowing the establishment of new experimental designs jointly and to incorporate a panoply of complementary biosensors, devices, hardand software solutions to capture human behavior [18]. Furthermore, LabLinking supports the increasing demand for sustainability and hybrid events in the post-COVID-19 world.…”