Things I've been reading lately...

About Umlaut - Code4Lib

Fri, 03 Jul 2009 03:43 GMT

Works with OpenURL link resolvers. I'm not exactly how sure this would work, but looking into it would be good.

PLoS ONE: A Principal Component Analysis of 39 Scientific Impact Measures

Wed, 01 Jul 2009 06:17 GMT

"Our results indicate that the notion of scientific impact is a multi-dimensional construct that can not be adequately measured by any single indicator, although some measures are more suitable than others. The commonly used citation Impact Factor is not positioned at the core of this construct, but at its periphery, and should thus be used with caution."

Grantsmanship: Information Resources to Help Researchers Get Funding

Wed, 01 Jul 2009 05:11 GMT

$5000 for one of the best library ad campaigns I’ve seen

Tue, 30 Jun 2009 03:12 GMT

I put this on Twitter last week while I was trying to figure out how to get permission to post one of these photos. The link got buzzed around really speedily and the photos were everywhere. I figured I’d drop it here for posterity too. Aren’t these trucks great looking? Another neat thing from Johnson County Library System (KS).

Kansas Is First Public University to Go Open Access

Sun, 28 Jun 2009 20:00 GMT

The University of Kansas is becoming the first public university -- following moves by all or parts of institutions such as Harvard and Stanford Universities and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology -- to make all faculty journal articles available free in digital form. Chancellor Robert Hemenway proposed the policy, which was endorsed by the Faculty Senate. The articles will be placed in KU ScholarWorks, a digital repository. Open access advocates see the creation of such repositories as a way to spread knowledge at a time that many journal subscriptions are too expensive for many academic institutions or individuals.

Overcoming Barriers to Collaborative Research: Report of a Workshop

Fri, 26 Jun 2009 08:33 GMT

Announcing PLoS Pathogens “Pearls”

Fri, 26 Jun 2009 05:53 GMT

The PLoS Pathogens editors and staff are thrilled to announce the debut of “Pearls,” a new series in the journal that will begin publishing monthly, starting with this June’s issue.

Each Pearl will be a concise primer on a topic of importance, meant to fill the gap between research articles and textbooks. Pearls will be tailored for graduate students and post-docs, while providing a format accessible to a general readership.

In contrast to the dynamic nature of research articles and textbooks, we hope that Pearls will provide a growing compendium of the “lessons that last,” for everyone from the scientist researching an area outside his or her field, to lay readers looking to learn more about a disease that affects them personally.

The benefit of such widely-accessible (not to mention open access!) introductory articles is clear, as evidenced by the level of enthusiasm we found when soliciting potential authors to write the first batch of Pearls. Under the editorial guidance of Dr. Hiten Madhani (University of California, San Francisco) we have seen Pearls grow from a kernel of an idea into what will soon bring focused educational content to readers of the journal.

More than anything, we’re excited to see all the ways in which Pearls may be used once they’re in the public domain: as lab references, class handouts, lecture slides, and undoubtedly in other ways that haven’t even occurred to us yet. We hope you will keep us informed as you find new ways to use them.

Watch for the first Pearl, by Dr. Michael S. Diamond (Washington University School of Medicine), published Friday, June 26 concurrent with an introductory editorial by Dr. Hiten Madhani.

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Canadian National archives reviews purchases of paper materials in digital age

Fri, 26 Jun 2009 02:50 GMT

Library and Archives Canada has put a moratorium on buying paper documents and books for its collection.
Doug Rimmer, assistant deputy minister of programs and services at Library and Archives Canada, told CBC News this week the moratorium is temporary and only applies to items it buys. It will still acquire documents other ways, including gifts and donations, websites and government records.

Bio-IT World

Thu, 25 Jun 2009 05:11 GMT

"Got PubMed? Pubget Searches and Delivers Scientific PDFs"

iNODE » OA begins at home…

Wed, 24 Jun 2009 06:56 GMT

Are libraries configuring their systems to make sure their users can get to Open Access Journals? They should be.

Large-Scale Assessment of the Effect of Popularity on the Reliability of Research

Tue, 23 Jun 2009 20:00 GMT

Based on theoretical reasoning it has been suggested that the reliability of findings published in the scientific literature decreases with the popularity of a research field. Here we provide empirical support for this prediction. We evaluate published statements on protein interactions with data from high-throughput experiments. We find evidence for two distinctive effects. First, with increasing popularity of the interaction partners, individual statements in the literature become more erroneous. Second, the overall evidence on an interaction becomes increasingly distorted by multiple independent testing. We therefore argue that for increasing the reliability of research it is essential to assess the negative effects of popularity and develop approaches to diminish these effects.

Free SMS Voting | Text Message Audience Polling : SMS Poll

Tue, 23 Jun 2009 04:21 GMT

Instead of stand alone PRS systems?

Looking for Landmarks: The Role of Expert Review and Bibliometric Analysis in Evaluating Scientific Publication Outputs

Wed, 17 Jun 2009 20:00 GMT

Objective

To compare expert assessment with bibliometric indicators as tools to assess the quality and importance of scientific research papers.

Methods and Materials

Shortly after their publication in 2005, the quality and importance of a cohort of nearly 700 Wellcome Trust (WT) associated research papers were assessed by expert reviewers; each paper was reviewed by two WT expert reviewers. After 3 years, we compared this initial assessment with other measures of paper impact.

Results

Shortly after publication, 62 (9%) of the 687 research papers were determined to describe at least a ‘major addition to knowledge’ –6 were thought to be ‘landmark’ papers. At an aggregate level, after 3 years, there was a strong positive association between expert assessment and impact as measured by number of citations and F1000 rating. However, there were some important exceptions indicating that bibliometric measures may not be sufficient in isolation as measures of research quality and importance, and especially not for assessing single papers or small groups of research publications.

Conclusion

When attempting to assess the quality and importance of research papers, we found that sole reliance on bibliometric indicators would have led us to miss papers containing important results as judged by expert review. In particular, some papers that were highly rated by experts were not highly cited during the first three years after publication. Tools that link expert peer reviews of research paper quality and importance to more quantitative indicators, such as citation analysis would be valuable additions to the field of research assessment and evaluation.

Open Access Bio and Paleo « Sauropod Vertebra Picture of the Week

Wed, 17 Jun 2009 02:21 GMT

A list of open access journals, monographs, researchers in paleontology (particularly vertebrate paleontology)

Yet more uninformed noodling on the future of scientific publishing and that kind of thing « Sauropod Vertebra Picture of the Week

Wed, 17 Jun 2009 01:26 GMT