The Quest to Topple Science-Stymying Academic Paywalls
Scientific publishers charge so much that even Harvard can't afford it anymore. A new publishing infrastructure could help.
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Scientists Despair As US Government Shutdown Drags on
Space missions can continue to collect data, but thousands of federal researchers are forced to stay home without pay.
Models Highlight Inherent Inefficiencies of Scientific Funding Competitions
Scientists waste substantial time writing grant proposals, potentially squandering much of the scientific value of funding programs. This Meta-Research Article shows that, unfortunately, grant-proposal competitions are inevitably inefficient when the number of awards is small, but efficiency can be restored by awarding funds through a modified lottery, or by weighting past research success more heavily in funding decisions.
Welcome to The Great Acceleration
The author argues that the two biggest forces driving change in the scholarly communication landscape are consolidation and regulation. By consolidation, he means that there’s a now constant cycle of mergers and acquisitions, reducing the number of independent players in the market. By regulation, we’re talking about the increasing number of rules and the compliance burden being put on researchers.
Federal Shutdown Includes Agencies That Are Key Supporters of University Research
Grant checks from NSF and other funders won't go out. Meetings on grant applications won't take place. Impact will grow with length of standoff. Trump threat on border with Mexico alarms some Texas campuses.
Donald Trump Finally Has a White House Science Adviser
Senate confirms meteorologist Kelvin Droegemeier to lead the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy.
The Costs of Reproducibility
The potential costs for early-career researchers in adopting practices to improve reproducibility as well as ways in which they can nontheless achieve their career goals.
Journal Shares Peer Reviews of Rejected Papers with Rival Titles
BMC Biology's 'portable peer review' policy aims to save editors and researchers time and effort, but academics question whether authors will want to share details of past rejections.
How Can Postdoctoral Researchers Engage with Policy? - Networks of Evidence and Expertise for Public Policy
How Can Postdoctoral Researchers Engage with Policy? - Networks of Evidence and Expertise for Public Policy
Workshop concludes that early-career researchers can make important contributions to policy decisions and experimenting with various forms of communication (i.e. opinion pieces, youtube channels, and tweeting at MPs) had the potential to improve knowledge transfer.
Global Educational Inequality Fuels the Demand for Open Science
Despite the expansion of global Internet coverage and open access journals, research from outside of the United States and Europe is underrepresented. Open science could improve access and representation.
Democrats Establish a New House 'Climate Crisis' Committee
But it will likely lack the broad powers favored by supporters of a Green New Deal.
US Postdoc Survey Results and the Interaction of Gender, Career Choice and Mentor Impact
US Postdoc Survey Results and the Interaction of Gender, Career Choice and Mentor Impact
The postdoctoral community is an essential component of the academic and scientific workforce, but a lack of data about this community has made it difficult to develop policies to address concerns about salaries, working conditions, diversity and career development, and to evaluate the impact of existing policies. A recent study aims to address this gap.
Top Retractions of 2018
From a self-sampling scientist to the downfall of a leading stem cell scientist, here's our naughty list.
Increasing Your Research's Exposure on Figshare Using the FAIR Data Principles
The FAIR principles were published in 2016 in a Scientific Data article titled 'FAIR Guiding Principles for scientific data management and stewardship'. These were developed to aid in the discovery and reuse of research data.FAIR stands for Findable, Accessible, Interoperable, and Reusable. Data that meet these principles are more optimal for reuse and discoverability and in turn increase your research's exposure.Here's how your data is more FAIR when it's on Figshare.Illustration by Jason McDermott of RedPenBlackPen.
More science than you think is retracted. Even more should be.
More science than you think is retracted. Even more should be.
While 18,000 retractions may sound like a lot, that amount is clearly just a fraction of the total number of papers that are a problem, as surveys indicate.
Elsevier Willing to Compensate Editors to Prevent Them from 'Flipping'
As some editors are moving to 'flip' their journal the publishing giant offers considerable compensations to change their minds.
Max Planck Society Discontinues Agreement with Elsevier
The Max Planck Society is going to discontinue their Elsevier subscription. By doing so the Society joins nearly 200 universities and research institutions in Germany who have already cancelled their agreements with Elsevier.
UC and Elsevier - Office of Scholarly Communication
The University of California is re-negotiating its systemwide licenses with some of the world's largest scholarly journal publishers, including Elsevier, to provide additional open access options for UC authors. In these negotiations, the UC is seeking a single, integrated contract with each publisher that covers both the university's subscriptions and open access publishing of UC research in their journals - what are often known as "publish and read" agreements.
The 'Future Book' Is Here, but It's Not What We Expected
Visionaries thought technology would change books. Instead, it's changed everything about publishing a book.
Vaccine Candidates for Poor Nations Are Going to Waste
Promising immunizations for diseases that affect mostly people in low- and middle-income countries need help getting to market.
Seven Steps to Boost Your Research Career in 2019
If you're looking to move labs, countries or sectors this year, or seeking general career inspiration, here's some advice from five researchers who featured in Nature Careers in 2018.
CWTS Launches New Course on Responsible Metrics
CWTS announces the launch of the new course called "Responsible Metrics for Research Evaluation".
Plan S: The Ambitious Initiative to End the Reign of Paywalls
The funder-driven push for freely accessible scholarly literature has divided the scientific community.
Scientists Want to Block the Move of Two USDA Research Agencies, but Are Making Little Headway
Scientists Want to Block the Move of Two USDA Research Agencies, but Are Making Little Headway
Many land-grant schools have submitted bids despite objections by researchers
Neutrino Discovery Launched a New Type of Astronomy
Particles associated with a blazar kick-start the field of neutrino astronomy.
Discovered: The Most-Distant Solar System Object Ever Observed
A team of astronomers has discovered the most-distant body ever observed in our Solar System. It is the first known Solar System object that has been detected at a distance that is more than 100 times farther than Earth is from the Sun. It was announced Monday by the International Astronomical Union's Minor Planet Center. Carnegie's Scott S. Sheppard, the University of Hawaii's David Tholen, and Northern Arizona University's Chad Trujillo made the discovery.
New ERC Vice Presidents and Scientific Council Members Appointed
Three new members of the European Research Council (ERC)'s governing body, the Scientific Council, have been appointed by the European Commission. The Scientific Council annonced two new ERC Vice Presidents.
Elsevier Acquires Science-Metrix Inc., Provider of Research Analytics Services and Data
Elsevier Acquires Science-Metrix Inc., Provider of Research Analytics Services and Data
Elsevier, the information analytics business specializing in science and health, has acquired Science-Metrix Inc., a research evaluation firm that provides science research evaluation and analytics to assess science and technology activities
Nature's 10
Ten people who mattered in science in 2018. Picks include a rogue gene-editor, a wunderkind physicist and a DNA detective who helped catch a serial killer.
China Introduces 'Social' Punishments for Scientific Misconduct
Offending researchers could face restrictions on jobs, loans and business opportunities under a system tied to the controversial social credit policy.
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