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B – Open access platforms for clinical trial data30 March 2016Navar AM, Pencina MJ, Rymer JA, et al. Use of open access platforms for clinical trial data. (Letter). JAMA 2016;315(12):1283-1284(doi: 10.1001/jama.2016.2374) Concerns over bias in clinical trial reporting have stimulated calls for more open data sharing. In response, multiple pharmaceutical companies have created mechanisms for investigators to access patient-level clinical trials data. Although more than […]
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B – Predatory open access30 March 2016Shen C, Bjork B. “Predatory” open access: a longitudinal study of article volumes and market characteristics. BMC Medicine 2015;13:230 (doi: 10.1186/s12916-015-0469-2) The so-called predatory publishers are causing unfounded negative publicity for open access publishing in general. The authors of this article used a multistage stratified sampling method to take a look into the predatory publishers […]
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B – Reproducibility in preclinical research30 March 2016Freedman LP, Cockburn IM, Simcoe TS. The economics of reproducibility in preclinical research. PLoS Biology 2016;13(6):e1002165(doi: 10.1371/journal.pbio.1002165) Low reproducibility rates within life science research undermine cumulative knowledge production and contribute to both delays and costs of therapeutic drug development. An analysis of past studies indicates that the cumulative (total) prevalence of irreproducible preclinical research […]
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B – Peer review: current landscape and future trends30 March 2016Jubb M. Peer review: the current landscape and future trends. Learned Publishing 2016;29:13-21(doi: 10.1002/leap.1008)This paper catalogues current initiatives and trends in the systems and processes surrounding peer review. It considers issues such as open and interactive reviews, post-publication comments and ratings, and the platforms provided by both publishers and other organisations to support such activity; […]
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B – Does it take too long to publish research?30 March 2016Powell K. Does it take too long to publish research? Nature 2016;530:148-151 Some researchers complain that publishing papers takes too long. But is the publication process actually becoming longer — and, if so, then why? To find out, Nature examined some recent analyses on time to publication and spoke to scientists and editors about their experiences. […]
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B – Gender-inequality problem in science30 March 2016Hilton D. Practical policies can combat gender inequality. Nature 2015;523:7 How can science address the gender-inequality problem? According to the author, Director of the Walter and Eliza Hall Institute of Medical Research in Melbourne (Australia), the mechanisms helping researchers balance work and home lives have made a positive difference to the gender balance at his […]
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B – Peer review effectiveness21 March 2016Siler K, Lee K, Bero L. Measuring the effectiveness of scientific gatekeeping. Proceedings of the National Academy of Science 2015;112(2):360-365(doi: 10.1073/pnas.1418218112) This article tracks the popularity of rejected and accepted manuscripts at three elite medical journals. The authors found that editors and reviewers generally made good decisions regarding which manuscripts to promote and reject. However, many […]
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B – Peer review and research data21 March 2016Murphy F. An update on peer review and research data. Learned Publishing 2016;29(1):51-53(doi: 10.1002/leap.1005) Technological advances in the amounts of data that researchers generate and use are causing problems for the scholarly communication system. How, when and by whom should quality checks and assurance be integrated into this – already overloaded – ecosystem? This paper […]
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B – Science and sexism21 March 2016Morello L. Science and sexism: in the eye of the Twitterstorm. Nature 11 November 2015 Social media has enabled an increasingly public discussion about the persistent problem of sexism in science. Although it is not yet clear whether the social-media conversation about sexism in science will help to create lasting change, some scientists think that […]
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B – Ethics approval of research21 March 2016Newson AJ, Lipworth W. Why should ethics approval be required prior to publication of health promotion research? Health Promotion Journal of Australia 9 November 2015 (Epub) (doi: 10.1071/HE15034) Most academic journals that publish studies involving human participants require evidence that the research has been approved by a human research ethics committee (HREC). Yet journals continue to […]
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A: ESE Author Q&A: Daniel Johnston18 March 2016Welcome to the first of a new regular feature we will be bringing you on the EASEBlog – interviews with our European Science Editing authors. Through these interviews, we aim to pursue our goals of scientific responsibility, knowledge sharing and communication by shedding more light on the people behind the articles you read in the […]
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B – Online plain English resources5 January 2016Gilliver S. Online plain English and readability resources. Medical Writing 2015;24(1):20-2 (idoi: 10.1179/2047480614Z.000000000272) To encourage individuals and businesses to write in simpler, more readable English, private and government-backed enterprises have created a number of freely available online resources. While most relate to general English use, some are devoted to writing about medical matters. […]
