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Tenure and Research Trajectories
Tenure is a defining feature of the US academic system with significant implications for research productivity and creative search. Yet the impact of tenure on faculty research trajectories remains poorly understood.
How to Revive Science in America
To remain cutting edge and competitive, the United States need to take tactical steps to foster better, more supportive science policy - including a strategic reset that seeks out global talent, diversifies funding sources, and clearly defines strategic priorities.
Inequality in Science and the Case for a New Agenda
The history of the scientific enterprise demonstrates that it has supported gender, identity, and racial inequity. To reverse this situation, the scientific community must reexamine its values and then collectively embark upon a moonshot-level new agenda for equity.
Ethical, Legal, and Social Issues in the Earth BioGenome Project
Ethical, Legal, and Social Issues in the Earth BioGenome Project
The Earth BioGenome Project (EBP) is an audacious endeavor to obtain whole-genome sequences of representatives from all eukaryotic species on Earth. In addition to the project's technical and organizational challenges, it also faces complicated ethical, legal, and social issues. This paper, from members of the EBP's Ethical, Legal, and Social Issues (ELSI) Committee, catalogs these ELSI concerns arising from EBP. These include legal issues, such as sample collection and permitting; the applicability of international treaties, such as the Convention on Biological Diversity and the Nagoya Protocol; intellectual property; sample accessioning; and biosecurity and ethical issues, such as sampling from the territories of Indigenous peoples and local communities, the protection of endangered species, and cross-border collections, among several others. We also comment on the intersection of digital sequence information and data rights. More broadly, this list of ethical, legal, and social issues for large-scale genomic sequencing projects may be useful in the consideration of ethical frameworks for future projects. While we do not-and cannot-provide simple, overarching solutions for all the issues raised here, we conclude our perspective by beginning to chart a path forward for EBP's work. There are no data underlying this work.
Academic-Humanitarian Technology Partnerships: an Unhappy Marriage?
Academic-Humanitarian Technology Partnerships: an Unhappy Marriage?
Working together seems like a good idea - especially when working toward a noble goal. However, little has been reported to date about the success and efficiency (or lack thereof) of such partnerships as a practical matter.
Face Masks Considerably Reduce COVID-19 Cases in Germany
Face Masks Considerably Reduce COVID-19 Cases in Germany
Open Science, Communal Culture, and Women's Participation in the Movement to Improve Science
Open Science, Communal Culture, and Women's Participation in the Movement to Improve Science
Exploring the structure, cultural frames of collaboration, and representation of women in the open science and reproducibility literatures.
Historical Comparison of Gender Inequality in Scientific Careers Across Countries and Disciplines
Historical Comparison of Gender Inequality in Scientific Careers Across Countries and Disciplines
A study suggests that the productivity and impact of gender differences are explained by different publishing career lengths and dropout rates. This inequality in academic publishing has important consequences for institutions and policy makers.
Scientists Who Leave Research to Pursue Other Careers in Science Are Still Scientists
Productivity, Prominence, and the Effects of Academic Environment
Past studies have shown that faculty at prestigious universities tend to be more productive and prominent than faculty at less prestigious universities. This pattern is usually attributed to a competitive job market that selects inherently productive faculty into prestigious positions. Here, we test the extent to which, instead, faculty's work environments drive their productivity. Using comprehensive data on an entire field of research, we use a matched-pair experimental design to isolate the effects of training at, versus working in, prestigious environments.
Opinion: Toward an International Definition of Citizen Science
What exactly qualifies as "citizen science" (CS)? It is interpreted in various ways and takes different forms with different degrees of participation. In fact, the label CS is currently assigned to research activities either by project principal investigators themselves or by research funding agencies.
Why Science Needs Philosophy
Present-day scientists often perceive philosophy as completely different from science. However, philosophy can have an important and productive impact on science.
Gender Disparities in Colloquium Speakers at Top Universities
Women are underrepresented relative to men as colloquium speakers, yet women neither decline talk invitations at greater rates nor question the importance of talks more than men do.
Plan S Falls Short for Society Publishers - and for the Researchers They Serve
The proposal known as Plan S has the admirable aim of achieving full OA across a wide swath of journal publications. But the path currently suggested has serious drawbacks that could jeopardize nonprofit science societies.
Scientific Prize Network Predicts Who Pushes the Boundaries of Science
Scientific prizes confer credibility to persons, ideas, and disciplines, provide financial incentives, and promote community-building celebrations. The article examines the growth dynamics and interlocking relationships found in the worldwide scientific prize network.
Changing Demographics of Scientific Careers: The Rise of the Temporary Workforce
Contemporary science has been characterized by an exponential growth in publications and a rise of team science. At the same time, there has been an increase in the number of awarded PhD degrees, which has not been accompanied by a similar expansion in the number of academic positions.
Failures Are Essential to Scientific Inquiry
Reproducibility failures occur even in fields such as mathematics or computer science that do not have statistical problems or issues with experimental design. Suggested policy changes ignore a core feature of the process of scientific inquiry that occurs after reproducibility failures: the integration of conflicting observations and ideas into a coherent theory.
The Matthew Effect in Science Funding
Article suggesting that positive feedback in funding may be a key mechanism through which money is increasingly concentrated in the hands of a few extremely successful scholars, but also that the origins of emergent distinction in scientists' careers may be of an arbitrary nature. (The article is closed access and requires a subscription to view the full text legally.)
Is Science Really Facing a Reproducibility Crisis, and Do We Need It To?
An Empirical Analysis of Journal Policy Effectiveness for Computational Reproducibility
An Empirical Analysis of Journal Policy Effectiveness for Computational Reproducibility
New guidelines from many journals requiring authors to provide data and code postpublication upon request is found to be an improvement over no policy, but currently insufficient for reproducibility.
The Preregistration Revolution
Widespread adoption of preregistration will increase distinctiveness between hypothesis generation and hypothesis testing and will improve the credibility of research findings.
How to Tackle the Childcare-Conference Conundrum
Four concrete suggestions - for Childcare, Accommodate families, Resources, Establish social networks - are directed toward research societies and conference organizers who are willing to take a leadership role in creating solutions, either incrementally or on a large scale.
Low Agreement Among Reviewers Evaluating the Same NIH Grant Applications
Low Agreement Among Reviewers Evaluating the Same NIH Grant Applications
No agreement among reviewers regarding the quality of 25 NIH grant applications in either their qualitative or quantitative evaluations.
Transparency in Authors' Contributions and Responsibilities to Promote Integrity in Scientific Publication
Transparency in Authors' Contributions and Responsibilities to Promote Integrity in Scientific Publication
Reasons to adopt the ORCID identifier and accept the CRediT taxonomy.
Reviewer Bias in Single- Versus Double-Blind Peer Review
Single-blind reviewing confers a significant advantage to papers with famous authors and authors from high-prestige institutions.
The Misleading Narrative of the Canonical Faculty Productivity Trajectory
80% of faculty exhibit a rich diversity of productivity patterns.