COVID-19: What do funders consider relevant research?

As emergency calls for research funding are made to tackle the COVID-19, some difficult questions come to mind: What types of knowledge are relevant? What types of research should be prioritised?

André Brasil, Soohong Eum, Wouter van de Klippe and Ismael Ràfols • April 30, 2020

Reminiscence: A note by two former interns

In 2015 and 2017, we were interns at the Centre for Science and Technology Studies (CWTS), and it was a valuable experience. Let us tell you about it, and why you may consider applying there.

Grischa Fraumann and Tung Tung Chan • April 28, 2020

Delineating COVID-19 and coronavirus research

Many initiatives are keeping track of research on COVID-19 and coronaviruses. These initiatives, while valuable because they allow for fast access to relevant research, pose the question of subject delineation. We analyse here one such initiative, the COVID-19 Open Research Dataset (CORD-19).

Giovanni Colavizza, Rodrigo Costas, Vincent Traag, Nees Jan van Eck, Thed van Leeuwen and Ludo Waltman • April 21, 2020

Precarious careers: postdoctoral researchers in the Netherlands

As the number of postdoc researchers grows, studies in the Netherlands reveal that they experience high stress levels. This post discusses mental health and the main stressors: a lack of academic career prospects, publication and grant pressure, work-life imbalance and lack of institutional support.

Inge van der Weijden and Christine Teelken • April 21, 2020

Broadening the perspective on Covid-19

While the pandemic has led many to first seek biomedical and epidemiological expertise, we should be careful not to overlook inputs from different scientific fields that could provide important insights in the current crisis. Here are some early academic responses you might have missed.

Jochem Zuijderwijk • April 16, 2020 • 1 comment

Beyond Open Access articles: briefs can provide wider and faster access to scientific knowledge

Many journals are making research on COVID19 publicly available. This is valuable, but studies on usability of research suggest scientists need to develop media to quickly reach professional stakeholders. Diego Chavarro explains how briefs helped address faster the bud rot disease in palm oil.

Diego Chavarro • April 09, 2020

Pre-COVID-19 workshop on virtual meetings and conferences

While attending a workshop on virtual meetings in academia, our author Carole de Bordes would not have expected how relevant this topic would soon be. This blog post gives insights into some solutions for more sustainable conferencing and collaboration from today’s perspective.

Carole de Bordes • April 07, 2020

Scholarly Knowledge Graphs: A Call for Participation

The scholarly community has worked hard to make its publications machine-findable, but not the knowledge within these publications. This is changing thanks to projects such as the Open Research Knowledge Graph, and you can participate!

Markus Stocker • March 23, 2020