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The Absurdity of University Rankings
Rankings are artificial zero-sum games. Artificial because they force a strict hierarchy upon universities. Artificial also because it is not realistic that a university can only improve its reputation for performance exclusively at the expense of other universities’ reputations.
Britain's 'Brutal' Cuts to Overseas Aid Put African Science Projects in Peril
Lifesaving research on fighting drought and climate change at risk after snap decision to halt crucial funding.
2 Interesting Scholarly Datasets Obtained from Web Scraping - Open Editors & Open Syllabus
2 Interesting Scholarly Datasets Obtained from Web Scraping - Open Editors & Open Syllabus
"Open Editors" & "Open Syllabus" are two interesting datasets obtained from wide scale web scraping due to lack of structured , machine readable data
ELife and PREreview Partner to Promote Greater Diversity in Peer Review
The two initiatives are continuing their joint efforts to increase the diversity of voices in scholarly review.
What It Will Take to Vaccinate the World Against COVID-19
A special report outlines the challenges - from unleashing the power of mRNA vaccines, to the battle for temporary intellectual-property relief.
We Need to Talk About the Lack of Investment in Digital Research Infrastructure
We Need to Talk About the Lack of Investment in Digital Research Infrastructure
Research software infrastructure is critical for accelerating science, and yet, these digital public goods are often unsustainably funded. Solving this problem requires an appreciation of the intrinsic value of research software outputs, and greater investment of time and effort into effectively funding maintenance of software at scale.
Row Erupts over University's Use of Research Metrics in Job-cut Decisions
Critics say redundancies are being decided using unreliable measures related to funding and citations, highlighting broader unease about the use of metrics in science.
Socioeconomic Roots of Academic Faculty
Article investigates the representativeness of faculty childhood socioeconomic status and whether it may implicitly limit efforts to diversify the professoriate in terms of race, gender, and geography.
Impact of the COVID-19 Pandemic on the Careers of Young Researchers
Impact of the COVID-19 Pandemic on the Careers of Young Researchers
Within the scope of the Career Tracker Cohorts study, postdocs were surveyed in order to learn more about potential changes in their work routines, effects on their research, and their own assessment of the impact the pandemic would have on their careers.
How Has COVID-19 Affected Research Funding, Publishing and Library Budgets?
How Has COVID-19 Affected Research Funding, Publishing and Library Budgets?
Global study of the effects of COVID-19 on research funding, publishing, and library budgets - the truth we found in the gap between perception and reality
Leveraging Open Science to Accelerate Research
The advancement of science — an intrinsically iterative process — is contingent on reporting practices that enable data to be findable, accessible, interoperable, and reusable to permit independent scrutiny, replication, and follow-on investigations. The urgency associated with the pandemic has created an imperative to accelerate the adoption of open science.
Opinion: Preprints in the Public Eye
ASAPbio has developed resources for preprint servers, institutions, scientists, and journalists to promote the responsible reporting of research in the media.
Gates Open Research - A Summary of Year Four
2021 marks four years of publishing on Gates Open Research, now the 2nd most popular publication venue for Gates-funded researchers. In this blog post, Ashley Farley, Program Officer of Knowledge and Research Services at the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, explores the publishing activity for the last year and the platform's growth in popularity and size.
What Scientists Do and Don't Know About the Oxford-AstraZeneca COVID Vaccine
Results confirming the vaccine's strong protection against COVID-19 were welcomed following last week's pause in roll-outs - but fresh questions have now emerged about the data.
Wikidata and Open Science: a Model for Open Data Work
Wikidata is a language-independent factual database belonging to the Wikimedia family which includes the particularly well-known Wikipedia. In an interview, Timo Borst explains the dimensions and particular significance of this database, especially in the context of Open Science.
Mellon Foundation Grant to Support Investigation into Hidden Costs of Open Infrastructure
Mellon Foundation Grant to Support Investigation into Hidden Costs of Open Infrastructure
New funding from The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation will support research and analysis into the hidden costs of open infrastructure. Hiring is now open for IOI's first Research Data Analyst.
Imposters and Impersonators in Preprints: How Do We Trust Authors in Open Science?
Preprints play a crucial role in open science but offer an opportunity to be gamed. Fictitious authorship in preprints show that open science needs checks and we need to collaborate to govern Open Science.
Cern Experiment Hints at New Force of Nature
Experts reveal 'cautious excitement' over unstable particles that fail to decay as standard model suggests
Track and Manage Your Public Access Mandates
Today, we are adding a Public access section to Scholar profiles to help you track and manage public access mandates for your articles.
Facebook Leak Underscores Strategy to Operate in Repressive Regimes
Exclusive: users are allowed to praise mass killers and 'violent non-state actors' in certain situations
Why Industry Internships Can Be Your 'golden Ticket' to a Prosperous Career
Why Industry Internships Can Be Your 'golden Ticket' to a Prosperous Career
The three of us took a break from our PhD programmes for a stint that enriched our CVs and improved our chances of career success.
They Had Mild COVID-19. Then Their Serious Symptoms Kicked In.
A new study illuminates the complex array of neurological issues experienced by people months after their coronavirus infections.
COVID-19 Recovery: STEM Isn't Enough to Save Us
Policymakers need insight from humanities and social sciences to tackle the pandemic.
The Fight Against Fake-Paper Factories That Churn out Sham Science
The Fight Against Fake-Paper Factories That Churn out Sham Science
Some publishers say they are battling industrialized cheating. A Nature analysis examines the 'paper mill' problem - and how editors are trying to cope.
Open Editors: A Dataset of Scholarly Journals’ Editorial Board Positions
Editormetrics analyse the role of editors of academic journals and their impact on the scientific publication system. However, such analyses would best rely on open, structured and machine-readable data on editors and editorial boards, whose availability still remains rare.
Police Warn Students to Avoid Science Website
Universities are urged to block a science research website, which police say could put data at risk.