For many researchers, the ongoing hype around recent developments with Generative AI (GAI) has left them feeling nonplussed, with so many new, unknown solutions for them to use. Added to well-reported questions over hallucinations and responsibly-developed AI, the advantages that GAI could offer have been offset by some of these concerns.

In response, Digital Science has developed its first custom GPT solution, which combines powerful data from Dimensions with ChatGPT’s advanced AI platform; introducing Dimensions Research GPT and Dimensions Research GPT Enterprise. 

Dimensions Research GPT’s answers to research queries make use of data from tens of millions of Open Access publications, and access is free to anyone via OpenAI’s GPT Store; Dimensions Research GPT Enterprise provides results underpinned by all publications, grants, clinical trials and patents found within Dimensions and is available to anyone with an organization-wide Dimensions subscription that has ChatGPT enterprise account. Organizations keen to tailor Dimensions Research GPT Enterprise to better meet the needs of specific use cases are also invited to work with our team of experts to define and implement these.

These innovative new research solutions from Dimensions enable users of ChatGPT to discover more precise answers and generative summaries by grounding the GAI response in scientific data – data that comes from millions of publications in Dimensions – through to the increasingly familiar ChatGPT’s conversational interface. 

These new solutions have been launched to enable researchers – indeed anyone with an interest in scientific research – to find trusted answers to their questions quickly and easily through a combination of ChatGPT’s infrastructure and Dimensions’ well-regarded research specific capabilities. These new innovations accelerate information discovery, and represent the first of many use cases grounded in AI to come from Digital Science in 2024.

How do they work?

Dimensions Research GPT and Dimensions Research GPT Enterprise are based on Dimensions, the world’s largest collection of linked research data, and supply answers to queries entered by users in OpenAI’s ChatGPT interface. Users can prompt ChatGPT with natural language questions and see AI-generated responses, with notifications each time any content is based on Dimensions data as a result of their queries on the ChatGPT platform, with references shown to the source. These are in the shape of clickable links, which take users directly to the Dimensions platform where they can see pages with further details on the source records to continue their discovery journey. 

Key features of Dimensions Research GPT Enterprise include: 

• Answers to research queries with publication data, clinical trials, patents and grant information
• Set up in the client’s private environment and only available to client’s end users
• Notifications each time content generated is based on Dimensions data, with references and citation details.

What are the benefits to researchers?

The main benefit for users is that they can find scientifically grounded, inherently improved information on research topics of interest with little time and effort due to the combination of ChatGPT’s interface and Dimensions’ highly regarded research specific capabilities. This will save researchers significant time while also giving them peace of mind by providing easy access to source materials. However, there are a number of additional key benefits for all users in this new innovation:

• Dimensions AI solutions makes ChatGPT research-specific – grounding the answers in facts and providing the user with references to the relevant documents
• It calls on millions of publications to provide information specific and relevant to the query, reducing the risk of hallucination of the generative AI answer while providing an easy route to information validation
• It can help overcome challenges of sheer volume of content available, time-consuming tasks required in research workflows and need for trustworthy AI products.

What’s next with AI and research?

The launch of Dimensions Research GPT and Dimensions Research GPT Enterprise represents Digital Science’s broader commitment to open science and responsible development of AI tools. 

These new products are just the latest developments from Digital Science companies that harness the power of AI. In 2023, Dimensions launched a beta version of an AI Assistant, while ReadCube also released a beta version of its AI Assistant last year. Digital Science finished 2023 by completing its acquisition of AI-based academic language service Writefull. And 2024 is likely to see many more AI developments – with some arriving very soon! Dimensions Research GPT and Dimensions Research GPT Enterprise, alongside all Digital Science’s current and future developments with AI, exemplify our commitment to responsible innovation and bringing powerful research solutions to as large an audience as possible. If you haven’t tested ChatGPT yet as part of your research activities, why not give it a go today?

About the Author

Simon Linacre, Head of Content, Brand & Press | Digital Science

Simon has 20 years’ experience in scholarly communications. He has lectured and published on the topics of bibliometrics, publication ethics and research impact, and has recently authored a book on predatory publishing. Simon is an ALPSP tutor and has also served as a COPE Trustee.

The post Fast forward: a new approach for AI and research appeared first on Digital Science.

The question, however, is just as important for academic institutions looking to check the data on their research programs: have you done your due diligence on that? If not, then a linked database such as Dimensions can help you.

Strategic Objectives

At a recent panel discussion hosted by Times Higher Education (THE) in partnership with Digital Science on optimizing research strategy, the question of due diligence was framed by looking at the academic research lifecycle and the challenges emanating from the increased amount of data now accessible to universities. More specifically, how universities could extract and utilize verified data from the ever–increasing number of sources they had at their disposal. 

Speaking on the panel, Digital Science’s Technical Product Solutions Manager Ann Campbell believes there are numerous benefits to using new modes of data to overcome problems associated with data overload. “It’s important to think holistically, of not only the different systems that are involved here but also the different departments and stakeholders,” she said. “It’s better to have an overarching data model or a perspective from looking at the research life cycle instead of separate research silos or different silos of data that you find within these systems.”

The panel recognized that self–reporting for academics could lead to gaps in the data, while different impact data could also be missed due to a lack of knowledge or understanding on behalf of faculty members. 

Digital Science seeks to address these problems by adding some power to its Dimensions linked database in the shape of Google BigQuery. By marrying this computing power to the size and scope of Dimensions, academics and research managers are empowered to identify specific data from all stages of the research lifecycle. This allows researchers to seamlessly combine external data with their own internal datasets, giving them the holistic view of research identified by Ann Campbell in the discussion. 

Data Savant

The theme of improving the capabilities of higher education institutions when it comes to data utilization has been most vividly described by Ann Campbell in her November presentation to the Times Higher Education Digital Universities conference in Barcelona in October. Memorably, she compared universities’ use of data to the plot of popular TV drama Game of Thrones. Professors as dragons? Rival departments as warring families? Well not quite, but what Ann did observe was that there are many competing elements within HEIs – research management, research information, academic culture, the library – and above them are senior management who have key questions that can only be answered using data and insights across all of them:

• Which faculties have a high impact? Should we invest more in them?
• Which faculties have high potential but are under–resourced?
• How can we promote our areas of excellence?
• How can we identify departments with strong links to industry?
• What real–world research impact can we feed back into our curriculum?
• Are we mitigating potential reputational risk through openness and transparency? 

Bringing these disparate challenges together requires a narrative, which is another reason why the Game of Thrones analogy works so well as we see that for all the moving parts of the story to work, a coherent story is required. This can be how an institution’s research culture strategy is working with a rise in early career international collaborations, how an increase in new funding opportunities followed a drive to increase interdisciplinary collaborations, or how the global reputation of a university could be seen to have improved its impact rankings position due to increased SDG–related research. 

Any good story needs to have the right ingredients, and where Digital Science can really help an institution is to bring together those ingredients from across an organization into viewable and manageable narratives. 

Telling Stories

But the big picture is not the whole story, of course. There are other, smaller narratives swirling through HEIs at any given time that reflect the different specialisms, hot topics or focus areas of the university. Three of these focus areas most commonly found in modern universities are research integrity, industry partnerships and research impact, and these were discussed recently at another collaborative webinar between THE and Digital Science: Utilising data to deliver research integrity, industry partnerships and impact. 

This panel discussion was a little more granular, and teased out some specific challenges for institutions when it came to data utilization. For research integrity, certain data relating to authorship can be used as ‘trust markers’, based around authorship, reproducibility and transparency. Representing Digital Science, Technical Product Solutions Manager Kathryn Weber–Boer went through the trust markers that form the basis of the Dimensions Research Integrity solution for universities. 

But why are these trust markers important? The panel discussion also detailed that outside universities’ realm of interest, both funders and publishers were increasingly interested in research integrity and the provenance of research emanating from universities. As such, products like Dimensions Research Integrity were forming a key part of the data management arsenal that universities needed in the modern research funding environment.  

In addition, utilization and scrutiny of such data can help move the dial in other important areas, such as changing research culture and integrity. Stakeholders want to trust in the research that’s being done, know it can be reproduced, and also see there is a level of transparency. All of these factors then influence the promotion and implementation of more open research activities.

Another important aspect of research integrity and data utilization is not just having information on where data is being shared in what way, it is also whether it is being shared as it has been recorded as, and where it is actually located. As pointed out in the discussion, Dimensions is a ‘dataset of datasets’ and allows the cross–referencing of these pieces of information to understand if research integrity data points are aligned. 

Positive Outlook

Discussions around research integrity and data management can often be gloomy affairs, but there is some degree of optimism now there are increasing numbers of products on the markets to help HEIs meet their goals and objectives in these spheres of activity. Effective data utilization will undoubtedly be one of THE critical success factors for universities in the future, and it won’t just be for the effective management of issues like research integrity or reputations. With the lightning fast development, adoption of Generative AI in the research space and increasing interest in issues like research security and international collaboration, data utilization – and who universities partner with to optimize it – has never been higher up the agenda. 

You can view the webinars here on utilizing new modes of data and delivering research integrity.

About the Author

Simon Linacre, Head of Content, Brand & Press | Digital Science

Simon has 20 years’ experience in scholarly communications. He has lectured and published on the topics of bibliometrics, publication ethics and research impact, and has recently authored a book on predatory publishing. Simon is an ALPSP tutor and has also served as a COPE Trustee.

The post Putting Data at the Heart of your Organizational Strategy appeared first on Digital Science.

The phrase ‘patently obvious’ is used in many contexts, from political exchanges to newspaper op-ed columns. Curiously, it is rarely used in the realm of actual patents, but in the case of General Electric’s (GE) HealthCare division, its use seems entirely appropriate.

In early 2023, GE made the decision to spin off GE HealthCare, and immediately following the move the new entity started its M&A strategy by acquiring two companies of its own – Caption Health and IMACTIS. At this early stage, is it possible to infer whether these were sound investments? Six months later, there is still a way to go before full year financial results are posted along with other financial data. However, Digital Science company IFI CLAIMS Patent Services – a global patent database provider for application developers, data scientists, and product managers – can gain insights by looking into the patents the newly enlarged GE HealthCare now holds.

Patents = Strategic Insights

It should be ‘patently obvious’, but checking companies’ patents can be a part of any due diligence process before an investment decision is made. Not only does this help understand risk and technology overlaps, it can also be used to determine where R&D efforts are currently focused in the target acquisition, and in turn set the strategy for the newly merged entity. Analyzing a company’s patent holdings in the midst of M&A dealings provides insights, such as: 

• Strategic direction of companies (i.e., such as the extent to which they are making strides in AI)
• Unique takes on M&A transactions as it is possible to determine – based on companies’ technologies – if core competencies overlap or not with the acquiring company
• Ascertaining if a company’s core competencies are enhanced or not by the acquisitions it’s made

IFI’s latest acquisition report takes a look at GE HealthCare’s acquisitions of IMACTIS and Caption Health’s patented technologies to determine the innovative direction of the company.

‘A good fit’

So what insights can be gleaned from patent data about GE HealthCare and its nascent M&A strategy? According to the report, the acquisition of Caption Health and IMACTIS were a ‘good fit’ for GE HealthCare. Both the acquisitions point towards GE HealthCare’s continued growth in terms of both AI and the application of AI to its existing core technologies. Specifically:

• IMACTIS is a tech healthcare company that offers, among other things, the provision of 3D virtual imaging to surgical navigation
• Caption Health focuses on providing AI capabilities and image data generation to ultrasound technologies

You can see from the chart below that GE HealthCare competes with a number of major companies in establishing AI-related patents, which surged in 2019-2020 before dipping in 2021. As such, the acquisitions in the early part of 2023 of companies that are focused on technology and AI in particular seem to be a good strategic move, especially given the furore around AI technology since late 2022.

What the data says

The report concludes that both Caption Health and IMACTIS make sense for GE HealthCare for several reasons. In the current competitive climate, Caption Health adds necessary AI capabilities while IMACTIS adds new dimensions to the suite of patents it has with 3D virtual images. So overall, it’s a gold star for GE HealthCare when it comes to enhancing its patent – and future commercial – strategy. Isn’t that obvious?

Three key takeaways

1. Digital Science’s IFI CLAIMS Patent Services – a global patent database provider for application developers, data scientists, and product managers – can help customers gain insights by looking into the patents held by firms, such as newly enlarged GE HealthCare.

2. IFI’s latest acquisition report takes a look at GE HealthCare’s acquisitions of IMACTIS and Caption Health’s patented technologies to determine the innovative direction of the company – the report concludes that both Caption Health and IMACTIS make sense for GE HealthCare for a number of reasons.

3. Checking companies’ patents should be a part of any due diligence process before any corporate investment decision is made, especially in pharmaceuticals sector.

About the Author

Simon Linacre, Head of Content, Brand & Press | Digital Science

Simon has 20 years’ experience in scholarly communications. He has lectured and published on the topics of bibliometrics, publication ethics and research impact, and has recently authored a book on predatory publishing. Simon is an ALPSP tutor and has also served as a COPE Trustee.

The post AI: To Buy or Not to Buy appeared first on Digital Science.

The 2023 survey saw over 6,000 responses and the report that has now been published takes an in-depth look at the responses and purposefully takes a much more analytical approach than has been seen in previous years, unveiling unprecedented insights.

Five key takeaways from The State of Open Data 2023

Support is not making its way to those who need it

Over three-quarters of respondents had never received any support with making their data openly available. 

One size does not fit all

Variations in responses from different subject expertise and geographies highlight a need for a more nuanced approach to research data management support globally. 

Challenging stereotypes

Are later career academics really opposed to progress? The results of the 2023 survey indicate that career stage is not a significant factor in open data awareness or support levels. 

Credit is an ongoing issue

For eight years running, our survey has revealed a recurring concern among researchers: the perception that they don’t receive sufficient recognition for openly sharing their data. 

AI awareness hasn’t translated to action

For the first time, this year we asked survey respondents to indicate if they were using ChatGPT or similar AI tools for data collection, processing and metadata creation. 

Diving deeper into the data than ever before 

This year, we dive deeper into the data than ever before and look at the differing opinions of our respondents when we compare their regions, career stages, job titles and subject areas of expertise. 

Figshare founder and CEO Mark Hahnel said of this approach, “It feels like the right time to do this. Whilst a global funder push towards FAIR data has researchers globally moving in the same direction, it is important to recognize the subtleties in researchers’ behaviors based on variables in who they are and where they are.”

This year features extensive analysis of the survey results data and provides an in-depth and unique view of attitudes towards open data. 

This analysis provided some key insights; notably that researchers at all stages of their careers share similar enthusiasm for open data, are motivated by shared incentives and struggle to overcome the same obstacles. 

These results are encouraging and challenge the stereotype that more experienced academics are opposed to progress in the space and that those driving progress are primarily early career researchers. 

We were also able to look into the nuanced differences in responses from different regions and subject areas of expertise, illuminating areas for targeted outreach and support. These demographic variations also led us to issue a recommendation to the academic research community to look to understand the ‘state of open data’ in their specific setting.  

Benchmarking attitudes towards the application of AI 

In light of the intense focus on artificial intelligence (AI) and its application this year, for the first time, we decided to ask our survey respondents if they were using any AI tools for data collection, processing or metadata collection. 

The most common answer to all three questions was,“I’m aware of these tools but haven’t considered it.”

Although the results don’t yet tell a story, we’ve taken an important step in benchmarking how researchers are currently using AI in the data-sharing process. Within our report, we hear from Niki Scaplehorn and Henning Schoenenberger from Springer Nature in their piece ‘AI and open science: the start of a beautiful relationship?’ as they share some thoughts on what the future could hold for research data and open science more generally in the age of AI. 

We are looking forward to evaluating the longitudinal response trends for this survey question in years to come as the fast-moving space of AI and its applications to various aspects of the research lifecycle accelerate farther ahead. 

Recommendations for the road ahead 

In our report, we have shared some recommendations that take the findings of our more analytical investigation and use them to inform action points for various stakeholders in the community. This is an exciting step for The State of Open Data, as we more explicitly encourage real-world action from the academic community when it comes to data-sharing and open data. 

Understanding the state of open data in our specific settings: Owing to the variations in responses from different geographies and areas of expertise, we’re encouraging the academic community to investigate the ‘state of open data’ in their specific research setting, to inform tailored and targeted support. 

Credit where credit’s due: For eight years running, our respondents have repeatedly reported that they don’t feel researchers get sufficient credit for sharing their data. Our recommendation asks stakeholders to consider innovative approaches that encourage data re-use and ultimately greater recognition. 

Help and guidance for the greater good: The same technical challenges and concerns that pose a barrier to data sharing transcend different software and disciplines. Our recommendation suggests that support should move beyond specific platform help and instead tackle the bigger questions of open data and open science practices. 

Making outreach inclusive: Through our investigation of the 2023 survey results, we saw that the stage of an academic’s career was not a significant factor in determining attitudes towards open data and we saw consensus between early career researchers and more established academics. Those looking to engage research communities should be inclusive and deliberate with their outreach, engaging those who have not yet published their first paper as well as those who first published over 30 years ago. 

What’s next for The State of Open Data?  

The State of Open Data 2023 report is a deliberate change from our usual format; usually, our report has contributed pieces authored by open data stakeholders around the globe. This year, we’ve changed our approach and we are beginning with the publication of this first report, which looks at the survey data through a closer lens than before. We’ve compared different subsets of the data in a way we haven’t before, in an effort to provide more insights and actionable data for the community.

In early 2024, we’ll be releasing a follow-up report, with a selection of contributed pieces from global stakeholders, reflecting on the survey results in their context. Using the results showcased in this first report as a basis, it’s our hope that this follow-up report will apply different contexts to these initial findings and bring new insights and ideas. 

In the meantime, we’re hosting two webinars to celebrate the launch of our first report and share the key takeaways. In our first session, The State of Open Data 2023: The Headlines, we’ll be sharing a TL;DR summary of the full report; our second session, The State of Open Data 2023: In Conversation, will convene a panel of global experts to discuss the survey results. 

You can sign up for both sessions here: 

The State of Open Data 2023: The Headlines

The State of Open Data 2023: In Conversation

About the Author

Laura Day, Marketing Director | Figshare

Laura is the Marketing Director at Figshare, part of Digital Science. Before joining Digital Science, Laura worked in scholarly publishing, focusing on open access journal marketing and transformative agreements. In her current role, Laura focuses on marketing campaigns and outreach for Figshare. She is passionate about open science and is excited by the potential it has to advance knowledge sharing by enabling academic research communities to reach new and diverse audiences.

The post The State of Open Data 2023: A more analytical approach provides unparalleled insights appeared first on Digital Science.

How old is Open Access? In some ways it is as old as research itself, as at least some results have always been shared publicly. However, since the first journals were published in 1665, accessibility has been an issue, with distribution of paper journals limiting potential readership. When the internet came along, it lowered the barriers to access considerably and opened up the pathway towards Open Access. But that process has been a gradual one.

As a tutor for ALPSP and course leader for some of its industry training modules, I have to be wary of approaching topics such as Open Access. Not because it is especially contentious or difficult, but because as someone who has been involved in scholarly communications for over 20 years, it still feels relatively ‘new’ to me, whereas for most attendees it is simply part of the modern furniture of publishing.

However, as Churchill once said, the longer you can look back, the farther you can look forward, so this year’s OA Week seems as good a time as any to review how its development has progressed over the years. Luckily, in Dimensions we have a tool which can look at millions of articles, both OA and closed access, published over the last quarter of a century.

Back story

Pointing to a specific time to say ‘this is when OA started’ is difficult, as experiments with OA publishing arrived with the internet in the late 1980s and early 1990s. Perhaps the first rallying cry in support of OA came in 1994 when Stevan Harnad published his Subversive Proposal. However, in 1998 several things happened which started to shape the way OA would develop, including the setting up of a number of support networks for authors to advise how to follow the OA path, as well as the founding of the Public Knowledge Project (PKP). New tools and services introduced then started to re-engineer how academic publishing operated, which were only amplified by the global adoption of the internet.

Such developments were followed in subsequent years by major declarations from academics and institutions in support of OA, mainly from European cities starting with ‘B’ – both Budapest and Berlin were the basis for such declarations that propelled Open Access forward and firmly onto the agendas of all stakeholders. Some countries and academic cultures adopted OA principles quickly such as Brazil, however it wasn’t until the 2010s that we started to see significant policy changes in Global North countries such as the US and the UK. 

These OA policies have now not only become commonplace, but have strengthened with initiatives like Plan_S in Europe and the OSTP (or Nelson) Memo in the US driving forward the transition towards fuller OA. It feels like the rate of change has increased in the last few years, but is this true and what does the picture look like globally?

Ch-ch-ch-changes

As we can see in the chart below using Dimensions, growth in OA research article publications has been relatively steady over the last 25 years, with a steeper rise in recent years followed by a shallower rise in 2022. This can perhaps be attributed in part to the introduction of Plan_S in 2018 and the introduction of funder mandates, but also the impact of the Covid-19 epidemic which drove OA publications upwards in 2020 and 2021, not least through the avenue of OA preprints.

However, appearances can be deceptive. While the chart may seem to plot a steady increase, the 12-fold rise over 25 years is significantly faster than the four-fold rise seen from all research articles, with all OA articles now making up well over half of all articles.

Looking more closely at the type of OA article recorded on Dimensions, if we look just at Gold OA research articles over time (ie. those published in journals, typically after payment of an article processing charge (APC)), we see a similar development, albeit with a slower take off and steeper rise in recent times.

However, if we look at Green OA research articles made available over the same period, we see a much more complex development, with higher rates of adoption in the early years of OA following a shallower trajectory before a huge spike in 2020, driven by the aforementioned pandemic. 

We can see the change more markedly below if we look at all publications (as opposed to just research articles) in more recent years, with Green and Gold running neck-and-neck until they diverged over the last decade or so. For many early proponents of Green Open Access who were opposed to the high profit margins enjoyed by many, this highlights how Green OA has failed in comparison to Gold Open Access. 

Looking ahead

What do these data tell us about the next 25 years? Perhaps the key takeaway is that shifts in behaviour of authors can be caused by concerted policymaking. Indeed, even the commitment to future mandates can be a catalyst for change as publishers prepare the groundwork quickly for upcoming changes. However, the biggest single shift towards OA happened during something wholly unforeseen (the pandemic), and as geopolitics is in its most volatile state in the whole 25 year period, maybe the biggest changes in OA are just round the corner. 

Request a demo or quote

About the Author

Simon Linacre, Head of Content, Brand & Press | Digital Science

Simon has 20 years’ experience in scholarly communications. He has lectured and published on the topics of bibliometrics, publication ethics and research impact, and has recently authored a book on predatory publishing. Simon is also a COPE Trustee and ALPSP tutor, and holds Masters degrees in Philosophy and International Business.

The post From subversive to the new normal: 25 years of Open Access appeared first on Digital Science.

Path to Open

Path to Open, a new open access pilot for book publications in the humanities and social sciences, has launched its collection this month, with 100 titles covering 36 disciplines from more than 30 university presses. This represents a major and much-needed step forward for Open Access publishing in general, and for the humanities specifically.

The pilot began in January as a collaboration among university presses, libraries, and scholars. It has emerged at a moment when students, administrators, and political leaders in the United States openly doubt the value and relevance of the humanities.¹ Their questions stem at least in part from a widespread misunderstanding of the term “humanities”, the disciplines it includes, and the inquiries posed by its scholars.

Such misunderstandings are perhaps not surprising. Scholarly books, often referred to as monographs, have served for decades as the primary mode for sharing research findings in the humanities but are currently distributed in ways that privilege a narrow audience.²

University presses – long-time champions and producers of monographs – have lost crucial institutional support, leaving many in difficult financial circumstances. The resulting high prices for monographs often exclude scholars, students, and others without affiliation at well-funded research libraries, and the problems multiply for those outside the established book distribution networks of North America and Western Europe.

Compared with STEM disciplines, the humanities receive little public funding for research and publication, making the move to open access much more challenging.

A commitment to finding new ways of sharing monographs drives the development of Path to Open. As Charles Watkinson and Melissa Pitts have noted, academic stakeholders “have long seen the value in investing significant resources to sustain science infrastructures that contribute to a common good. It is essential to their mission that they collaborate and invest with that same care in the crucial infrastructure for humanities research embodied by the network of university presses”.

Path to Open seeks to create an infrastructure that allows more publishers – especially small and mid-sized university presses – to experiment with open access distribution while also boosting the circulation of research from a community of diverse humanities scholars. The initiative is distinctive among open access models because, as John Sherer explains, it proposes a “compromise between the legacy model of university press publishing and a fully funded OA model”.

Path to Open operates as a library subscription – administered exclusively by JSTOR – that guarantees payments of at least US$5,000 per title to participating publishers, to help offset potential losses in digital sales. With the launch of the online collection this month, presses also have the option to sell print editions of all books, as well as direct-to-consumer e-books.

A sliding scale for subscription costs provides more equitable access to libraries of varying sizes and budgets, and more than 60 libraries have joined to date, including members of the Big Ten Academic Alliance. The initial 100 titles transition to full open access by 2026, and new titles will be added in each of the following three pilot years to reach an expected total of 1,000 open access books by 2029.

The model aims to reduce financial risk for presses while also acknowledging lingering hesitation about open access publication within the humanities community. As John Sherer finds, many authors fear that “an OA monograph would be viewed less favorably than a traditional print monograph would in the tenure and promotion review process”.

Monographs take years to produce, and they function quite differently from journal articles in the scholarly ecosystem. Many of these books maintain their relevance for years, even decades, past the original publication date. Over the life of the pilot, JSTOR will track various usage metrics for all titles in the collection both before and after the transition to open access.

The partnership with JSTOR provides a unique opportunity to gather data in a controlled environment, with hopes of gaining much-needed insights into the behavior of readers, the effect of open access on print sales, and the timing of peak impact for monographs in various disciplines. Understanding such issues is key to strengthening the vital infrastructure that supports humanities research and to ensure its place alongside open STEM scholarship.

The American Council of Learned Societies (ACLS) has committed to providing a robust and transparent structure for community engagement with Path to Open. In consultation with the Educopia Institute, ACLS is developing a forum to encourage dialogue among key stakeholders, including publishers, libraries, scholars, and academic administrators. Inviting scholars into these conversations is critical for a shared understanding of how open access affects humanistic disciplines, institutions of higher education, students, and individual academic careers.

Our hope at ACLS is that an inclusive dialogue about Path to Open will generate greater understanding of the stakes for various constituents within the humanities community, and guide decisions for the future of scholarly publishing in sustainable and equitable ways.

¹ Nathan Heller, “The End of the English Major,” The New Yorker, February 27, 2023.

² See also Michael A. Elliott, “The Future of the Monograph in the Digital Era,” The Journal of Electronic Publishing 18, no. 4 (fall 2015).

About the Author

Sarah McKee, Project Manager, Publishing Initiatives | American Council of Learned Societies (ACLS)

As Project Manager for Publishing Initiatives, Sarah McKee works to support a healthy ecosystem for the creation and dissemination of humanistic scholarship across disciplines and institutions. She previously administered Digital Publishing in the Humanities, sponsored by the Mellon Foundation and based at Emory University’s Fox Center for Humanistic Inquiry, and served as managing editor of the born-digital New Georgia Encyclopedia at the University of Georgia Press. She is an advisory board member for the Next Generation Library Project and is a co-author of the report Multimodal Digital Monographs: Content, Collaboration, Community (2022).

The post New path opens up support for humanities in OA publishing appeared first on Digital Science.

Digital Science’s flagship product Dimensions has announced a new solution for research institutions and industry, helping to identify risks associated with government research security requirements. Why is the Dimensions Research Security app the right choice for your research operations?

Universities and industry involved in research and development are no strangers to the need to protect intellectual property and mitigate against risk. Nevertheless, organizations around the world – from the FBI in the United States to Universities UK – are increasingly calling for these risks to be taken more seriously.

Inevitably, additional government regulations and recommendations have followed, requiring research institutions – and individual researchers who receive government funding – to demonstrate compliance within their local jurisdictions. Failing to do so can result in penalties and loss of reputation, as well as the impact on research, and economies that rely on that research.

The complexity of these issues combined with the vast networks of research globally means that institutions often can’t “go it alone” – they need something to shine a stronger, brighter spotlight on research security compliance, and to provide the right information to assist in making the best decisions.

Dimensions – among the world’s largest linked research databases – is perfectly placed to be a beacon of light on these issues.

The new Dimensions Research Security app

The Dimensions Research Security app includes a visual dashboard that enables research organizations to obtain information quickly and easily.

Reviewing research collaborations for compliance? Dimensions Research Security enables you to thoroughly and efficiently conduct due diligence on potential research collaborations, helping you to save on time and resources.

With Dimensions Research Security, you can:

• Efficiently verify disclosures
• See all research collaborations – via grant funding information or co-authorship on publications, in patents or in clinical trials
• Surface multiple affiliations for individual researchers
• Screen for restricted entities or individuals
• Pinpoint countries of interest
• Uncover direct and indirect funding sources
• Reveal undisclosed collaborations or international funding sources that could put grant applications at risk.

Research organizations are then able to assess and prioritize potential risks, with the power of world-leading information at their fingertips.

Find out more about the new Dimensions Research Security app at the Dimensions blog site, or ask for a demonstration today.

About Dimensions

Part of Digital Science, Dimensions is among the world’s largest linked research database and data infrastructure provider, re-imagining research discovery with access to grants, publications, clinical trials, patents and policy documents all in one place. www.dimensions.ai. Follow @DSDimensions on X (Twitter) and LinkedIn.

About the Author

David Ellis, Press, PR and Social Manager | Digital Science

David has 30 years’ experience in media and communications. With a background in broadcast journalism, his career focus has been in research communication – including science, health science and medicine – spanning 25 years of service in the university sector. His experience also includes both internal and external communications in the health and manufacturing sectors.

The post Dimensions shines a spotlight on research security appeared first on Digital Science.

To celebrate the world of books, colleagues at Digital Science have shared their recommendations and reviews of books that have interested and inspired them over summer.

Currently reading The Earth Transformed by Peter Frankopan, which takes a sweeping look at the ways humanity and climate change have impacted each other (leading to development and demise) over time.

—Heather Luciano

Review: Freedom to Think: Protecting a Fundamental Human Right in the Digital Age by Susie Alegre.

Strolling through St Pancras Station, London waiting on my train, I popped into a bookshop looking for a specific title. Unsurprisingly, they didn’t have the obscure book I wanted, so I perused a bit more. Two addictions consume my life: tea and books. If I go into either type of store, I never walk out empty handed. I left with Freedom to Think.

“Human rights law guarantees freedom of thought, conscience, belief and opinion….” This book lays out the laws to the educated reader giving us the words to understand and speak about our most sacred freedom.

Alegre illuminates the art of mind control by what is and is not done to people. Like learning to paint – you must think as much about what is there as what is not – the negative space created to poignantly focus the observer. Through human-developed algorithms and strategize investments with little legal oversight, humanity is threatened as much by what we see as what we are excluded from seeing.

“Freedom of thought is about the space to think before you share.” We need that space. But no one will give it to us; it must be claimed for ourselves.

Give this book a think.

—Leslie McIntosh

If you’re looking for creepy but not gruesome, I recommend T. Kingfisher’s The Hollow Places. I also just finished her book A House with Good Bones but didn’t find it as hauntingly bizarre.

—Sara Gonzalez

I read Munroe Bergdorf’s autobiography, Transitional. Bergdorf is one of the very few transgender PoC fashion models (among many other things she does). She has been the campaign face for L’Oreal (before they sacked her for political posts on Instagram in 2017). The book is less about being transgender and more about what she learned on her journey. About racism, equality, being in the spotlight of public attention and finally purpose in life: “Nowhere feels like home when it’s you that you’re running from.”

—Sasha Gӧbbels

Review: The Book Eaters by Sunyi Dean.

I started a book club with other East Asian women to explore Asian history and Asian authors. My favorite this year is The Book Eaters by Sunyi Dean, who is a biracial autistic woman. It features Devon, a member of a secretive humanoid species/society that subsists on physically consuming books, while retaining the knowledge within. However, she gives birth to a son who has a mutation that makes him prefer human brains instead of books. We follow her struggle to help and protect him. The result is a riveting mashup of science fiction, fantasy, horror with an undercurrent of Margaret Atwood.

—Jamie Liu

Review: Magpie Murders by Anthony Horowitz.

Great book for puzzle and mystery fans, this is a compelling story within a story. An editor receives a famous author’s latest manuscript and she expects all will be the same as his previous award winning books. But all is not the same in the book, nor in her life, after receiving the manuscript minus the last chapter. What happened to the last chapter? The book weaves in and out of the first story and the ‘book within the book’, and although the story in the manuscript is a traditional British Manor Murder Mystery, reminiscent of Agatha Christie and Sherlock Holmes, the detective Atticus Pünd solves mysteries in his own unique way.

This is a clever book with great twists and a beautiful voice. Best of all, the ending is completely unexpected. Great fun.

—Carola Blackwood

Currently reading Braiding Sweetgrass. Beautifully written nonfiction which explores the intersections of Indigenous knowledge and plant science. Lots of food for thought for those interested in the culture of science!

Also recommend The Priory of the Orange Tree if you like things with dragons.

—Emily Alagha

I recently finished bell hooks’ The Will to Change, which I recommend to anybody wanting a more complete critical approach to understanding patriarchy and its effects. That it is a book written with love and care, and is in hooks’ unique and inviting colloquial style, makes her argument all the more impactful: though men have clear rewards in patriarchy, we are all ultimately its victims and must attend to the role we all play in perpetuating and sustaining patriarchal culture.

—Adrien De Sutter

Review: The Colony by Audrey Magee.

I was fascinated by the premise of this book, which on the one hand was a slightly odd tale of two outsiders spending the summer on a remote Irish island, but was also intertwined with the Troubles in Northern Ireland in the 1970s as well as offering an allegory of the impact of colonial rule. Not only does the author create fascinating narratives on all these levels, she also manages to build tension through a slow burn of a plot, portraying very real characters as well as a wicked dark humour. All this combined to offer a very rich reading experience with a heartbreaking ending to boot. Very highly recommended.

—Simon Linacre

Currently in the middle of two books – first is Understanding Privacy by Heather Burns. I’m “In the middle of” because the dead tree edition hasn’t arrived yet, but can’t help but read ahead in the ePub. Picked this up ‘cos I’ve been following Heather’s engaging posts on the birdsite. Nearly finished The Malevolent Seven by Sebastien de Castell ‘cos I’m a sucker for catchy titles – it’s (absolutely not!) beardy wizard fantasy stuff, but needed something to while away the hours as a recent guest at the Royal Infirmary. A fun read!

—Jamie MacIsaac

Review: Lark Ascending by Silas House.

In Lark Ascending, Silas House strikes a poignant balance between hope and grief over the state of the world (present and future). It’s a dystopian tale but not a sci-fi one, featuring a heartbreaking queer love story and one of the best dog characters ever written. Left me with lots of feelings and lots to think about – as have House’s other novels. I‘ve been reading a lot of what might loosely fall into the genre of ‘climate fiction’ over the past few years, and this one really stands out.

—Lisa Curtin

On my list (for a very summer-fiction entry) is the recently published Somebody’s Fool by Richard Russo.

—Tyler Ruse

Having also watched (and survived) Oppenheimer, Eve of Destruction is on my list. Might be grim summer reading though!

—Niall Cunniffe

For a lighter read this summer I went with The Geography of Bliss by Eric Weiner. A great book for the beach or downtime during the summer.

—Shannon Davis

The post What are YOU reading? Top recommendations and reviews from Digital Science appeared first on Digital Science.

For many of us, prosecco seems to have become the sine qua non of any gathering, combining as it does the popping cork, light fizz and often considerable price benefit compared to champagne. Celebrated on 13 August each year, it offers a chance for prosecco producers to market their wines, and for the rest of us to, well, enjoy them!

But aside from the marketing fluff, what’s going on academically with prosecco? Dimensions and Altmetric – as well as being fantastically powerful tools to aid deep investigation of research topics – can also offer insight into almost any field of study. So, what can we glean from recent studies on prosecco?

In Figure 1, we can see that the number of articles that mention ‘prosecco’ has steadily grown in the last decade, with a pronounced increase in 2021. However, this seemed to tail off in 2022, so perhaps interest in the topic has started to wane. This almost exactly mirrors global sales of prosecco and Italian wine in general, which have tailed off in 2022 after performing well during the pandemic.

However, if we break it down by the number of articles published by Sustainable Development Goals – one of the most useful ways of delineating research on Dimensions – we can see that while there has been a drop in research related to Good Health and Well Being (SDG #3) and Life on Land (#15), there has been a marked increase in research on prosecco related to SDG #13, namely Climate Action. This perhaps reflects overall increased focus in this topic, particularly when related to food production where climate change is impacting on vines and crops, and any ability to meet increased demands.

Certainly the reporting on prosecco-related research is maintaining its upwards trajectory, as we can see from Figure 3, which shows a steady increase in citations of research in this area. As there is a lag between citations and publications, we may see this drop away in future if the decline in research on prosecco remains on a downward trend.

When we look at the influence of the research outside academia, we may have expected a similar continual rise, however data from Altmetric shows if anything a steeper decline than we saw in research output. This could be explained in part by the much shorter lead time that digital influence exhibits compared to citations, but it could also be a strong indicator that prosecco research has had its place in the sun, and academic interest has gone rather flat.

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About the Author

Simon Linacre, Head of Content, Brand & Press | Digital Science

Simon has 20 years’ experience in scholarly communications. He has lectured and published on the topics of bibliometrics, publication ethics and research impact, and has recently authored a book on predatory publishing. Simon is also a COPE Trustee and ALPSP tutor, and holds Masters degrees in Philosophy and International Business.

The post Has Prosecco research lost its fizz? appeared first on Digital Science.

The Digital Science team is getting ready to head off to San Francisco for the annual Science Foo Camp. This is a remarkable gathering of scientists, thinkers, technologists, creators and communicators, who come together over three days in mid-July.

‘Sci Foo’, as it’s affectionately known, is unlike any other science conference. Hosted by ‘X’ (formerly “Google X”), it is an ‘unconference’ with no fixed agenda, and is co-organized by Google, O’Reilly Media, Digital Science and Nature.

Since the first event in 2006, Sci Foo has aimed to do things differently – 18 years later it retains that original spirit and continues to attract some of the most prolific players on the world stage. Indeed, the British astrophysicist Lord Martin Rees has called Sci Foo the ‘Woodstock of the Mind’.

Forging an environment of openness and collaboration, attendees are encouraged to connect and share ideas with those around them. The schedule includes the always popular lightning talks but discourages keynotes and corporate overviews – and is dominated by unconference sessions that are proposed and organised by the attendees themselves. This format allows for unparalleled diversity of disciplines and thinking, with a rich seam of discussion, debate and insights running through the event. Conversations are encouraged to continue over mealtimes and into the evening.

As one of the organizers, Digital Science is especially excited for Sci Foo 2023. With around 250 attendees, we have also provided travel support to a number of early-career scientists from South Africa, Ecuador, Brunei and other countries and we are looking forward to the energy they will bring to what promises to be a fantastic Sci Foo.

We would also like to thank our co-organizers including  Tim O’Reilly and Marsee Henon from O’Reilly Media; Raiya Kind and Laurie Wu from Google; Magdalena Skipper of Springer Nature; and Sci Foo veteran Cat Allman, as well as the many volunteers from across all these organisations – it would not be possible without them. 

If you want to know more about Sci Foo 2023 including who’s there and what’s trending, please look out for online chat about the event via the official hashtag #SciFoo and discussion on Twitter and LinkedIn from the Digital Science team.

About the Author

Amarjit Myers, Head of Strategic Events | Digital Science

The post Heading to Sci Foo! appeared first on Digital Science.