Knowledge synthesis (KS) refers to a synthesis of studies, research and related evidence...ask your librarian for assistance
Aim of wiki "channel":
This wiki channel aims to explore the increasingly complex issues at the nexus of knowledge synthesis (KS) and AI-powered searching (see definition and A to Z Listing). The challenge is not only the emergence of AI search tools, but their potential impact on the ethical conduct and workflows of knowledge synthesis, and the need to uphold the credibility, transparency, and reproducibility of searches.
At the same time, questions arise about the potential opportunities these tools may offer—but, how are their models trained? What are their pricing models? What role can librarians play in helping researchers understand and critically evaluate them?
The focus is therefore on examining how AI tools might be integrated—if at all—into research workflows without compromising scientific reproducibility or ethical integrity.
Note: This open textbook (or wiki channel) is intended to help librarians and information professionals understand and critically evaluate AI tools, but it should not be interpreted as an endorsement or promotion of AI technologies. Rather, the goal is harm mitigation and responsible adoption—or non-adoption—where appropriate.
Definitions:
What is knowledge synthesis?
The Canadian Institutes of Health Research (CIHR) defines knowledge synthesis as: "...integration of research findings of individual research studies within the larger body of knowledge on the topic. A synthesis must be reproducible and transparent in its methods, using quantitative and/or qualitative methods, and will often take the form of a systematic review. Such an investigation will follow the methods developed by organizations such as The Cochrane Collaboration and the Joanna Briggs Institute."
What is artificial intelligence (AI)?
According to Wikipedia: — "...artificial intelligence is the capability of computational systems to perform tasks typically associated with human intelligence, such as learning, reasoning, problem-solving, perception, and decision-making."
AI-powered searching — a definition refers to a range of tools and advanced search skills that health librarians cultivate to provide advanced research and consultation services to users in the AI era. The ability to locate highly-relevant studies to support knowledge synthesis activities of researchers is in high demand in 2025, but AI is disruptive due to tools such as Open Evidence, otto-SR, Perplexity, PubMed.ai, Undermind.ai. (A few of these tools are also used in KS for screening and data extraction.)
Note: Will Google Scholar survive the rise of AI-powered searching?
Although OpenAI is leading in the general AI space, independent and big AI companies are developing new search tools all the time, and experimenting with AI-powered academic searching in support of research. How will these tools affect our traditional bibliographic databases?
Consensushttps://consensus.app/ uses AI to distill findings from scientific research "reading" papers and extract key results.
Dimensions AI https://www.dimensions.ai/ provides free access to over 100 million publications and preprints to help you find papers; it shows the context - with citations, news and social media mentions, and links to funded grants and patents.
Permission is granted to copy, distribute and/or modify this document according to the terms in Creative Commons License, Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International. The full text of this license may be found here: CC by-nc-sa 4.0
Disclaimer:
Note: Please use your critical reading skills while reading entries. No warranties, implied or actual, are granted for any health or medical search or AI information obtained while using these pages. Check with your librarian for more contextual, accurate information.
