Summary
Summary¶
The advent of open, large-scale databases of neuroimaging results, whether full, unthresholded statistical maps or simple coordinates, has allowed for the development of a wide variety of methods for performing fMRI meta-analyses and related analyses. These methods are often (but not always) released as tools for the community to use, written in a range of languages and with highly variable interfaces. As a consequence, it is difficult for meta-analysts to keep abreast of the current literature and to employ whatever method is most appropriate to address a given question. NiMARE provides a centralized repository for these tools, which will make it easier for researchers to keep track of new methods, and also provides said tools with extensive documentation and a standardized programmatic interface, which will allow researchers to use whatever tool is most appropriate for their research, without unnecessarily steep learning curves.
Given that NiMARE is open source and collaboratively developed on GitHub, methodologists may contribute their own meta-analytic algorithms directly, or interested third parties may implement these algorithms using papers or external tools as a basis for understanding the methods.