Systematic reviews of the literature: A better way of addressing basic science controversies

Systematic reviews have long been an important part of the clinical literature; however, they have been slower to take hold among basic scientists. In this editorial, we outline a number of reasons why systematic reviews should be used more widely in the basic sciences: as a means to more quickly and accurately identify success and failures, to understand how variations in methodology and models may affect research, to identify and mitigate bias, and to inform future research directions. The process of conducting a systematic review is briefly described and finally, recent examples of systematic reviews in the basic sciences are acknowledged.