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The science of citations

The science of citations

Because the odds that a single paper will spread a good idea are simply too small. Three is good. Four is better. Five is much better.

The New Reddit Journal of Science

The New Reddit Journal of Science

The intent of this program is to enable the general public to distinguish between an educated opinion and a random comment without a background related to the topic.

Academia Stack Exchange

Academia Stack Exchange

Academia Stack Exchange is a question and answer site for academics and those enrolled in higher education. It's 100% free, no registration required.

We can fix peer review now

We can fix peer review now

Scientists are asked to comment on static, final, published versions of papers, with virtually no potential to improve the articles. This is the state of post-publication peer review today.

Changing winds in science funding

Changing winds in science funding

Bias can taint scientific research, as conclusions are sensitive to the conscious and unconscious choices scientists make in study design, data collection, analysis, and interpretation.

The post-doctoral situation: interview with Gregory Petsko

The post-doctoral situation: interview with Gregory Petsko

Gregory Petsko discusses some of his own findings about the post-doctoral situation: "We asked institutions to tell us how many post-docs they had. Almost without exception, they couldn't do it."

Biomedical research: are all the results correct?

Biomedical research: are all the results correct?

Poor reproducibility is only one of many factors that together make biomedical research highly inefficient.

An automatic paper generator

An automatic paper generator

SCIgen is a program that generates random Computer Science research papers, including graphs, figures, and citations.

A quite insightful April's fool joke by PLOS founder Michael Eisen

A quite insightful April's fool joke by PLOS founder Michael Eisen

"I co-founded the PLOS in 2002 because I believed deeply that the open access publishing model PLOS espoused and has come to dominate was good for science, scientists and the public."

Open science? Try good science

Open science? Try good science

Is Open Science already here? Not exactly. Open Science is more than a subset of projects that make data available or sharing of software tools, often because they received specific funding to do so.

How the Wellcome Trust spends its money

How the Wellcome Trust spends its money

The Wellcome Trust has released new data and infographics to show where it spends out money.

Post publication peer review

Post publication peer review

New scientists have grown up commenting on their friends pictures, their silly comments on Facebook and their favorite YouTube videos. Will this practice carry over into their scientific publishing?

The mostly unread world of academic papers

The mostly unread world of academic papers

According to one study, which was presumably read by more than three people, half of all academic papers are read by no more than three people.

Getting academic research into the public sphere: the rundown on repositories

Getting academic research into the public sphere: the rundown on repositories

List of the different types of current online repositories

The exploitative economics of academic publishing

The exploitative economics of academic publishing

Much of research in the US is inaccessible not only to the public, but also to other scientists. Fortunately, cheap open-access alternatives are not only possible, but already beginning to take root

Our PhD employment problem, part I

Our PhD employment problem, part I

Our PhD employment problem is very simply described: there's a mismatch between the number of graduate students earning doctorates each year and the number of tenure-track faculty positions available to them. There are too few tenure-track jobs for the PhD recipients who are qualified to compete for them.