January 2011 Archives

A California university professor has been charged with peeing on a colleague's campus office door.

[T]he 2nd USA Science & Engineering Festival will inspire the next generation of scientists and engineers with school programs and nationwide contests throughout the 2011/2012 school year and a finale Expo in Washington DC in the Spring of 2012. The Expo is the nation's largest celebration of all things science & engineering and features over 1500 hands-on activities and over 75 performances on multiple stages. The 2010 Festival attracted over 500,000 people of all ages and had strong support from the White House and Congress. (from the Festival website).

AIBS APPLAUDS PRESIDENT'S CALL TO ACTION ON SCIENCE, SCIENCE EDUCATION
 
Washington, DC -- During the 2011 State of the Union Address, President Obama challenged the nation to recommit to a spirit of innovation.  The President noted that the nation must invest the resources needed to improve science education and drive the scientific research that will answer our most pressing questions in health, the environment, and energy. 
 
"The President has repeatedly expressed his commitment to scientific discovery, innovation, and education.  AIBS is pleased to see that his commitment remains strong."  Said Dr. Richard O'Grady, AIBS Executive Director. 
 
AIBS Public Policy Director, Dr. Robert Gropp, applauded the President's remarks on science.  "We were heartened to hear that President Obama plans to submit to Congress in the coming weeks a budget that would continue to make investments in scientific research.  I look forward to seeing the details." 
 
"Science can not move forward and respond to our grand challenges in an environment of uncertainty.  The nation must make sustained and predictable investments in research and development."  Said O'Grady.
 

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• Does a small temperature rise actulally matter?
• What are climate change feedback loops?
• Are humans definitely causing global warming?
• Is the world getting warmer?

The Presidential Awards for Excellence in Science, Mathematics, and Engineering Mentoring, awarded by the White House each year to individuals or organizations, recognize the crucial role that mentoring plays in the academic and personal development of students studying science or engineering--particularly those who belong to groups that are underrepresented in those fields. By offering their expertise and encouragement, mentors help prepare the next generation of scientists and engineers while ensuring that tomorrow's innovators reflect the full diversity of the United States.

• Richard L. Cardenas, St. Mary's University, TX
  Anthony Carpi, John Jay College of
• Criminal Justice, City University of New York, NY
  
• Isaac J. Crumbly, Fort Valley State University, GA
  
• Jo Handelsman, Yale University, CT
  
• Douglass L. Henderson, University of Wisconsin-Madison, WI
  
• Bruce A. Jackson, Massachusetts Bay Community College, MA>br />
• Marigold L. Linton, University of Kansas, KS
  
• Maja J. Matarić, University of Southern California, CA
  
• Gerard F. R. Parkin, Columbia University, NY
  
• Julio J. Ramirez, Davidson College, NC
  
• Michelle A. Williams, University of Washington, WA
  
• Center for Innovation in Engineering and Science Education, Stevens Institute of Technology, NJ
  
• Baccalaureate and Beyond Community College Mentoring Program, State University of New York, Purchase College, NY
  
• Grinnell Science Project, Grinnell College, IA
  
• Women in Science and Engineering Mentoring Initiatives, Center for Research on Women and Gender, University of Illinois-Chicago, IL
  

Nitrogen deposition, competition and the decline of a regionally threatened legume, Desmodium cuspidatum

Krissa A. Skogen, Kent E. Holsinger and Zoe G. Cardon

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• Part I: OMB's secret 'openness' policy
• Part II: Can federal scientists speak freely with journalists?
• Part III: OMB as a force for secrecy
• Part IV: Sources, documents, further information

UC Berkeley will lay off nearly 150 employees this year, Chancellor Robert Birgeneau said Thursday.

Some of the workers have already been notified, university spokeswoman Claire Holmes said, and most will be let go by June. About the same number of jobs will be eliminated through other means, such as retirements and voluntary departures.

About a quarter of the 280 or so positions have salaries of $100,000 or above, Birgeneau said in a letter to the campus. The job losses are expected to save the university about $20 million.

No faculty positions will be cut, but other layoffs will come from all areas of the campus. ("UC Berkeley to lay off nearly 150 employees," Matt Krupnick, San Jose Mercury News)

The HINARI Programme, set up by WHO together with major publishers, enables developing countries to gain access to one of the world's largest collections of biomedical and health literature. More than 7,500 information resources are now available to health institutions in 105 countries, areas and territories benefiting many thousands of health workers and researchers, and in turn, contributing to improved world health.

HINARI was launched in January 2002, with some 1500 journals from 6 major publishers: Blackwell, Elsevier Science, the Harcourt Worldwide STM Group, Wolters Kluwer International Health & Science, Springer Verlag and John Wiley, following the principles in a Statement of Intent signed in July 2001. Since that time, the numbers of participating publishers and of journals and other full-text resources has grown continuously. Today more than 150 publishers are offering more than 7,500 information resources in HINARI and others will soon be joining the programme.

BioOne sees sustainable scholarly publishing as an inherently collaborative enterprise connecting authors, nonprofit publishers, academic institutions, research libraries, and research funders in the common goal of maximizing access to critical research.

Kimberly Parker, programme manager at HINARI, said that the decision to withdraw free access was not unusual practice once publishers start to secure "active sales" in a country. 

"You're witnessing a moment of bipartisan joy," said Assemblyman Tim Donnelly, R-San Bernardino, vice chairman of the Higher Education Committee. "I'm ashamed that I didn't think of this myself." (source)

"They really need to come down from their ivory tower and see and feel what real people are going through," [Assemblyman Hill] said.

• The publication is distributed in Portable Document Format (PDF)
• In an online serial publication with an International Standard Serial Number (ISSN) or
• (in an additional proposal) a PDF with and International Standard Book Number (ISBN).

1. [W]e need to have scientific theories that are sufficiently robust that they can generate testable predictions that transcend the particularities of time and place. Results generated in one population/place/time can then be challenged by testing in other populations/places/times.
2. [W]e need to be scrupulous in our documentation of our results and the methods we employ to generate these results.
3. [W]e need to be willing to share our data.

Compare that lengthy, tortuous process of debate and review among experts to the "debate" that intelligent design creationists want to have in high school textbooks. Which process do you think is most likely to help kids understand their world?

1. Major funding agencies willingly back studies challenging scientific consensus.
2. Most everyone would be thrilled to overturn the consensus.
3. Scientists offer opinions based on their scientific knowledge and a critical interpretation of data.

This is the key lesson to take from this incident, and it applies to all scientific disciplines: peer-review continues after publication. Challenges to consensus are seriously entertained - and are accepted when supported by rigorous data. Poorly substantiated studies may inspire further study, but will be scientifically criticized without concern for funding opportunities. Scientists are not "afraid to lose their grant money".

The incumbent will direct and manage the media and outreach services of the IPCC in collaboration with key partners, in particular, governments, academics, inter-governmental and non governmental organizations. S(he) will contribute to the formulation of IPCC's overall communication strategies and policies, and advises all stakeholders on matters pertaining to the IPCC's communication priorities and issues, in addition to acting as spokesperson. The incumbent will ensure that communication and outreach on programmed activities are carried out in a timely manner and all outputs produced meet required standards. S(he) will advise and coach IPCC experts on when and how to interact with the media and the public in general. S(he) will oversee information activities of the different working groups and guide their communication experts and will propose and implement initiatives to strengthen the IPCC relations with governmental and intergovernmental partners. The incumbent will explore new cooperation and partnerships, including fund raising. S(he) will direct and supervise all web information of the IPCC Secretariat, will maintain and strengthen liaison with the media and will lead the development of communication and outreach programmes, including the social media (twitter, facebook, blogs, etc.).

The conservative bloc of scientists would argue that hard science and data are all that is necessary, which is expected: silos are hard to break down. But in a world where decisions are made by folks without technical backgrounds, having scientists that can talk to the rest of the world is the glue that holds everything together.

Cover via Amazon

It makes perfect sense for politicians to decide how much the federal government should invest in basic research through the National Science Foundation. That's what governing is all about. Making choices. Setting priorities. But having politicians make decisions about individual research grants makes as little sense as letting them decide whether to build a bridge to nowhere.

Science should be open to anyone who wants to make the effort to understand it and how it works.  But asking people to do a blind search on a handful of terms and then make a determination as to the 'value' of the research is absurd. Does Dan Hind really think that the average person who was enjoying living in a house they couldn't actually afford and watching their property values soar would have seen a need to fund the small fraction of economists who were warning the bubble was near burst stage?  Or that the outcome of democratic science is going to be anything other than people advocating for research money to spent in areas that have touched them personally?