Research

By Scott Jaschik, for Inside Higher Ed

Hundreds of people have signed a petition protesting about new quarterly journal Porn Studies that is due to launch in spring next year.

Without proper reporting social and psychological experiments are a “waste of money”, researchers have said.

The Wellcome Trust has announced plans to extend its open access policy to include scholarly monographs and book chapters

Leaders lead, not their brains, argue Dirk Lindebaum and Mike Zundel

When anthropologists pointed out that cultural factors impeded tropical disease treatment campaigns, some fellow scientists reacted with outrage

A derelict research lab once used by Sir James Black is revived in an artistic installation

Getting image permissions for monographs is costly, slow and vexing

Adrian Furnham has had his share of peer review nightmares, but the frailties of the system have also worked in his favour

Focus on people, not technology or the DSM, to treat mental illness, Tom Burns tells Matthew Reisz

Study identifies better use of research capacity outside Anglo-American sphere

Nation likely to lose fruitful position in UK research system, experts say

The publisher Elsevier has disassociated itself from an article by a trade association it belongs to that condemns proposed open-access mandates in several US states.

The University of Glasgow has finally confirmed that a former professor was found guilty of falsifying data in five papers by an investigation that ended last August.

Coalition of academics, publishers and funders rejects metric ‘obsession’

The government would like to see more publishers take up schemes that waive open access publishing fees for researchers from universities that subscribe to its journals, a senior civil servant has said.

Germany and Eastern Europe rocked by string of high-profile cases within their governments. Paul Jump reports

UK universities must form business partnerships to demonstrate the need for public investment. By Elizabeth Gibney

The excuses academics use to explain away fraudulent research results

Lab audits could demonstrate integrity, 3rd World Conference on Research Integrity hears. By Elizabeth Gibney

Technology augments but cannot supersede intuition, argues Annette Karmiloff-Smith

Research facility clusters mean the benefits are too localised, say Henry Overman and Christian Helmers

A department of Imperial College London has withdrawn the offer of an internship placement being sold by auction after the move received heavy criticism.

By Scott Jaschik, for Inside Higher Ed

Editors have noted a “certain level of sloppiness” creeping into research papers, the executive editor of the Nature Publishing Group has said.

But investigation finds that practice ‘did not always meet’ expected standards

Obama defends discipline from Republican attacks

A new grouping of southeast institutions accounts for a third of EPSRC-funded work. Paul Jump reports

Husband-and-wife academics debate the merits of the research excellence framework

The divisive country-club culture at ‘Midwest University’ that places status above study and raises partying to a vocation

Entrepreneurial and academic excellence are pursued side by side, and the dividends are clear to see

A “big data” health research centre at the University of Oxford has been announced as the latest to benefit from the government’s UK Research Partnership Investment Fund.

Rather than the academy relaxing its ethical standards, perhaps areas of the media need to raise their game, argues Keith Richards

University of London college targets graduate employability and research cash

Robert Gordon head critiques traditional rationale for scholarly activity

A BBC scheme aims to tackle gender inequality

A bill to reform the libel system in England and Wales is set to become law after completing its passage through the Houses of Parliament.

The University of Oxford professor of tropical medicine and global health has been named as the new director of the Wellcome Trust.

Ensuring that knowledge translates into growth will be among the priorities the incoming government chief scientific adviser Mark Walport has set himself for the next five years.

Students at the London School of Economics who were on a controversial visit to North Korea with undercover BBC journalists have hit out at the university, saying it has placed them in greater danger than the trip itself.

Academics count the costs of Panorama’s North Korea exposé

Paul Manners worries that rush to tell research stories turns academics into salesmen and undermines collaboration

Research club offers hands-on access to fascinating materials from aerogel to baby teeth

Vast digital archive of court records 1674-1913 is ‘dead people’s big data’

Theatre director uses fellowship to give dramatic shape to the stories of ex-combatants

Exceptions in the UK funding councils’ open access policy will be made for researchers hired from abroad, the Higher Education Funding Council for England’s head of research has pledged.

The BBC’s use of a student group from the London School of Economics to gain access to North Korea could jeopardise the overseas reputation of UK universities and the work of academics more generally, according to the sector’s representative body and the LSE director

Scientists in the UK have won a major Czech research contract worth £10 million to develop laser technology.

Report says distribution would change little if based on institutions’ research council income

Future European funding may depend on identifying how research affects women as well as men

Yachtswoman’s charity funds research into innovative economic ideas

In a world untouched by the Sun for millennia, a UK scientist found research heaven and arachnophobe hell

Cardiff University’s dean of medicine has been cleared of research misconduct but the institution has found a former member of his lab guilty of image falsification in four papers.

Research Councils UK has removed from its guidance on its open-access policy an exhortation for institutions and authors to make sure a “proper market in article fees” operates.

The British Library – and the nation’s other legal deposit libraries – have officially taken on responsibility to archive UK web content, opening up immense opportunities for researchers.

Publication ethics committee issues new guidelines for peer review

Canadian human-rights case highlights disquiet at practices of Beijing-funded centres up on foreign campuses

Episciences Project offers new publishing formula

Universities should vet research outputs before they get to the publishing (and scandal) stage, say Roger Watson and Mark Hayter

US president Barack Obama’s announcement that $100 million (£66 million) is to be invested in an initiative to map the human brain has been welcomed by the country’s higher education institutions.