Emily Parke (University of Auckland)
Microbial model systems are often productively studied in complex interaction and iteration with mathematical and other models. These sorts of studies do not fit neatly into either of two traditional categories of scientific inquiry, hypothesis-testing or exploratory experiments, as they are currently characterized in the literature. The ways in which they fail to fit are revealing of how different modes of scientific practice interact. Drawing on cases where microbial models are updated and re-evaluated in light of insights from other models (and vice versa), I suggest some revisions to the traditional categories of hypothesis testing and exploration.
