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'Flattening the Curve' May Be the World's Best Bet to Slow the Coronavirus

'Flattening the Curve' May Be the World's Best Bet to Slow the Coronavirus

Experts say by taking aggresive measures, governments have a shot at stamping out new chains of transmission of the coronavirus.

How Canceled Events and Self-quarantines Save Lives, in One Chart

How Canceled Events and Self-quarantines Save Lives, in One Chart

This is how we all help slow the spread of coronavirus.

COVID-19: Funding Bodies Around the World Pledge New Money for Virus Research

COVID-19: Funding Bodies Around the World Pledge New Money for Virus Research

Research charities Wellcome Trust and the Gates Foundation announced they are joining forces with the credit card company MasterCard in a $125 million push to speed up development of drugs for treating COVID-19 infections, in the latest example of the rush to fund research into the novel coronavirus.

Why Do People Migrate In Europe? A New Online Tool Explains

Why Do People Migrate In Europe? A New Online Tool Explains

Universities and research organisations have joined forces to develop a new interactive tool that explores how free movement has affected EU economies and societies.

Does Closing Schools Slow the Spread of Coronavirus? Past Outbreaks Provide Clues

Does Closing Schools Slow the Spread of Coronavirus? Past Outbreaks Provide Clues

A researcher who forecasts epidemic spread argues that proactive closures, though disruptive, could help.

A Disease Tracker Backed by Gates and Zuckerberg Tackles Covid-19 in Cambodia

A Disease Tracker Backed by Gates and Zuckerberg Tackles Covid-19 in Cambodia

The two tech titans funded an effort to bring metagenomic sequencing and software to poor countries. Now, it's helping trace the spread of the new coronavirus.

Making a Plan When Planning Is Impossible

Making a Plan When Planning Is Impossible

Travel bans, office closures, and conference cancellations have publishers and societies thinking about how best to ensure that scholarly content continues to be reviewed and distributed. This post by Angela Cochran looks at some of the impacts and questions whether.

#COLA4ALL Shuts Down UC Santa Cruz

#COLA4ALL Shuts Down UC Santa Cruz

Graduate students at the University of California, Santa Cruz, shut down campus Thursday as part of their ongoing strike for a cost of living adjustment, and all other system campuses saw their own one-day protests. Santa Cruz graduate assistants went on a grade strike in December, then a full labor strike this month. Tensions mounted last week when the university fired or disqualified 80-some grads from spring assistantships for continuing to withhold undergraduate grades. Graduate assistants blocked all entrances to the Santa Cruz campus before dawn, forcing the university to cancel classes, except those offered online. Many faculty and undergraduate supporters joined the picket lines on that campus and across the UC system starting midmorning. As of last week, graduate assistants at the Santa Barbara campus are also on a labor strike for a COLA, and assistants at the Davis campus are on a grade strike. Systemwide, graduate instructors make about $2,400 pre-tax, per month, for nine months out of the year. Strikers say that they need between $1,400 and $1,800 extra per month to be able to secure housing in California's expensive rental markets and have anything left over for utilities and food. The United Auto Workers, with which UC's graduate workers are affiliated, has urged the university to reopen their contract to bargain for a COLA. This week it authorized a systemwide strike vote for April on the grounds that the university has committed unfair labor practices. The university has filed a similar claim against graduate workers. The system said in a statement that it "values all our graduate students, including academic student employees (ASEs) who are essential to UC's teaching mission, supporting the university as teaching assistants, readers and tutors. However, that mission is in jeopardy when ASEs refuse to fulfill their teaching obligations." The system noted that these assistants are striking in violation of their union contract, negotiated in 2018, and said it's "unfortunate that the UAW has resorted to announcing a strike authorization vote as the university continues pursuing opportunities to engage productively with graduate students on housing affordability and other issues."

Airlines Are Burning Thousands of Gallons of Fuel Flying Empty 'ghost' Planes So They Can Keep Their Flight Slots During the Coronavirus Outbreak

Airlines Are Burning Thousands of Gallons of Fuel Flying Empty 'ghost' Planes So They Can Keep Their Flight Slots During the Coronavirus Outbreak

Airlines are running empty "ghost" flights because of European rules forcing operators to run their allocated flights or risk losing their slots.

Empfehlungen für eine nationale Open-Science-Strategie in Österreich

Empfehlungen für eine nationale Open-Science-Strategie in Österreich

Die Arbeitsgruppe Open-Science-Strategie des Open Science Network Austria (OANA) hat Empfehlungen für eine nationale Open Science Strategie in Österreich erarbeitet und lädt ein, das Dokument bis zum 05.04.2020 online zu annotieren bzw. zu kommentieren.

What Should Be the Essential Baseline Practices for Repositories That Manage Research Data?

What Should Be the Essential Baseline Practices for Repositories That Manage Research Data?

COAR and SPARC have published a joint response to the OSTP Request for Public Comment on Draft Desirable Characteristics of Repositories for Managing and Sharing Data Resulting From Federally Funded Research. Good data management is critical for ensuring validation, transparency of research findings, as well as to maximize impact and value of publicly-funded research through data reuse.

Open Peer-Review Platform for COVID-19 Preprints

Open Peer-Review Platform for COVID-19 Preprints

The public call for rapid sharing of research data relevant to the COVID-19 outbreak is driving an unprecedented surge in (unrefereed) preprints. To help pinpoint the most important research, Nature launched Outbreak Science Rapid PREreview, an open-source platform for rapid review of preprints related to emerging outbreaks.

Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences - Led by Women, Advancing Women

Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences - Led by Women, Advancing Women

The initiative to ensure that qualified women have a place at the Academy.

To Help 'left Behind' Britain, More Adults Need to Feel Able to Go to University

To Help 'left Behind' Britain, More Adults Need to Feel Able to Go to University

Adult learning is at a 20-year low because mature students can't study flexibly. This must change

Shortage of Personal Protective Equipment Endangering Health Workers Worldwide

Shortage of Personal Protective Equipment Endangering Health Workers Worldwide

WHO calls on industry and governments to increase manufacturing by 40 per cent to meet rising global demand.