Quik Start Guide - Example Protocol

Quikest is designed to help you build a collaborative protocol utilizing AI tools. Let’s start with an example protocol to familiarize yourself with the interface. We’ll be using a simple, nostalgic experiment from my undergrad as an example: Studying ducks at the UC Davis Arboretum.

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The Beginning

To begin, select “Create a protocol”. You’ll find this in the upper right corner of the Protocols page at all times, or in the lower center of the Protocols page before you create your first protocol.

The Template

Once you select “Create a protocol”, you’re given a bevy of templates to choose from. Scroll until you find the “Field” template and select that template.

The Generation

Next, you’ll be prompted to answer three questions to help guide the AI generation of the protocol. You’ll see example answers on the right side of the popup. They’re rather in depth and while you can click on them to auto-fill the answers to the questions, they’re best used as inspiration. For our purposes, copy the following basic answers and paste them in their respective boxes.

• Question 1: What natural phenomena or behaviors are you observing in the field, and what is the primary research question?
  • Answer 1: I am observing the behavioral patterns of ducks at the UC Davis Arboretum and whether males and female ducks exhibit different patterns.
• Question 2: How will you collect and record data in the field including observational and environmental variables?
  • Answer 2: Every minute, over the course of 20 minutes, I will make observations of ducks in a specific area of the Arboretum in a notebook. Specifically, I will note the actions of each duck, whether they are eating, sleeping, swimming, etc.
• Question 3: What are the specific environmental conditions or contexts that may influence your observations, and how will you account for them?
  • Answer 3: I will limit my observations to a specific area of the Arboretum and not attempt to follow individual ducks if they leave the specific area. I will attempt to choose an area of the Arboretum that is less frequented by humans to minimize the chance of interference. ‍

Once you’ve pasted the answers, select “Generate Protocol”.

The Next Steps

Voila! You now have an AI generated protocol to help facilitate your field observations of ducks at the UC Davis Arboretum. At this point, you can edit the protocol, share with others, make comments, etc. Essentially, anything you can do with your preferred document editor (e.g., Microsoft Word, Google Docs, Pages, etc.), you can do in Quikest and likely more. So, left click, right click, highlight, type a forward slash (/)… press a button and see what happens.

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The Caveat

One very important caveat as you use Quikest: AI is amazing, but like all entities, it can make mistakes. For instance, when I generated a protocol using the above answers, the generated protocol looked like this:

You’ll notice that the Materials and Reagents section contains items that are neither materials nor reagents, but rather equipment. If I was to actually use this protocol in the field, I would copy the items, paste them in the Equipment section and delete the Materials and Reagents section.

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The point here is not that AI is fallible and should not be trusted. Rather than an omniscient and omnipotent entity that solves all our problems, AI simply helps us get to our destination faster. In this case, it quickly generates a draft protocol. More quickly than I can, that’s for sure! But as quick as AI may be, we still have to steer said protocol to its final form.

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So, go forth with Quikest! Spend less time writing protocols and more time doing fun science, like laying in the sun and watching ducks do duck things. 🦆

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