ONEMODEL›In practice›Canadian Institutes of Health Research

Real-world deployment

Research-funding impact evaluation

ONEMODEL is being used to assess the impacts associated with CIHR-funded research—an attribution problem where funding decisions, research activity, downstream outcomes, and time are connected.

Real deploymentFederal research funder

A funding-to-impact evaluation

Canadian Institutes of Health ResearchThe platform provides a system framework for evaluating how research funding propagates through a complex environment rather than treating grants as isolated transactions or relying only on static before-and-after comparisons.

Funding portfolioGrant and program choices define the intervention being evaluated.

Research systemInstitutions, researchers, collaboration, and knowledge production shape how funding is converted into activity.

Downstream pathwaysResearch can create effects through health, capacity, innovation, workforce, and economic channels over different time horizons.

Counterfactual evaluationImpacts are assessed relative to a coherent alternative path, with assumptions and attribution made explicit.

Questions the platform supports

Use one connected model to test decisions that cross organizational boundaries.

Question 01

What effects are associated with funded research?

Move beyond immediate research outputs to evaluate downstream pathways and longer-run consequences.

Question 02

How should impacts be attributed?

Use an explicit system model and counterfactual rather than assuming every observed outcome was caused by the grant.

Question 03

When do impacts emerge?

Represent the lags and sequencing between funding, research activity, translation, and downstream outcomes.

What is connected

The value comes from keeping the system together.

Evaluation structure

A research-funding intervention enters a broader system.

Funding decisions Programs and grants create specific changes relative to a baseline.
Research activity The platform can represent pathways through which funded activity develops and propagates.

Counterfactual logic

Impact requires a credible comparison.

With funding Simulate the system under the observed or proposed funding pathway.
Without or alternative funding Compare against a defined counterfactual rather than a simple historical trend.

Multiple outcomes

The value of research is not captured by one metric.

Direct outcomes Research activity, capacity, outputs, and associated economic effects.
Downstream outcomes Longer-run health, social, institutional, or economic consequences where supported by evidence.

Governance and evidence

Evaluation remains auditable.

Data integration Inputs from multiple sources can be governed and reconciled.
Traceable assumptions Model structure and scenario choices remain visible through the evidence chain.

Scale of use

A production problem, not a toy example.

CIHRnational health-research funder

Agent-basedevaluation method

Multi-yearengagement

A different use of simulation: evaluating investment in knowledge.

This application shows that ONEMODEL is not limited to forecasting economies or infrastructure. It can also be used for evaluation when impacts emerge through complex pathways, attribution is difficult, and the timing of outcomes matters.

CanadaBuys — CIHR agent-based modelling procurement ↗

Why ONEMODEL

When the decision spans systems, the model needs to span them too.

ONEMODEL keeps assumptions, data, system relationships, scenarios, execution, and results inside one traceable analytical chain.