The Open Science Prize: enabling discoveries for health

The Open Science Prize has been launched by the Wellcome Trust, the US National Institutes of Health (NIH) and the Howard Hughes Medical Institute to unleash the power of open content and data to advance biomedical research and its application for health benefit.

The Prize encourages technology experts and inventive researchers to submit innovative ideas for services, tools, and platforms that will make it easier for scientists, innovators and the wider public to discover, access and re-use the digital information being generated through health research. The aim of the Open Science Prize is also that of promoting international collaborations for the development of solutions that can benefit the global research community.

The competition consists of two phases and the opportunity to receive a prize of $230,000.

The deadline for entries is 29 February 2016.

For more information visit https://www.openscienceprize.org/.

Federica Fina
(Research Data Management)

Wellcome peer review report

Copyright Wellcome Trust CC BY 2.0

Copyright Research Information Network

A Wellcome Trust commissioned report centred around the issue of peer review was published last month. The report, conducted by the Research Information Network, sets out a detailed analysis of peer review, the critiques, and the new alternative systems for peer review that have appeared in recent years.

The report defines traditional peer review as 'the process of subjecting an author’s scholarly manuscript to the scrutiny of others who are experts in the same field’ (p.6) These experts must assess whether the research is of sufficient quality to be included in the journal. Many journals also require reviewers to assess the originality and significance of research, however it is worth noting that some open access mega-journals such as PLOS ONE and Collabra do not require this.

The report details many of the criticisms commonly made of peer review. One criticism is that peer review is not effective at weeding out unsound research. The report makes mention of the fact that retraction rates have increased in recent years, although the volume of retractions is a very small proportion of the 2 million papers published each year globally. Another criticism mentioned in the report is the burden faced by reviewers, the vast majority of whom are unpaid. Research suggests that around 3 million papers are submitted for review each year, and many are submitted and reviewed more than once. This represents a significant burden on reviewers, half of whom spend more than 6 hours on each review (see our recent blog post on the new journal Collabra that compensates reviewers by paying them a proportion of APC income). Other criticisms include potential for bias, expense, delays, and the potential for subversive behaviour.

Given the criticisms and the potential new avenues afforded by new digital technologies there have been many experiments with alternative forms of peer review. To take one example, open review sees both author's and reviewer's names disclosed from the outset (for example BMJ and PeerJ) and is designed to encourage constructive comments and avoid overly harsh reviews. Journals such as Frontiers (see previous blog post here) have expanded on this idea and introduced an interactive communication element to their open review process.

After investigating the various forms of peer-review the report concludes that peer review "remains a bedrock of the scholarly communications system", but reflects that there is likely to be increasing pressure on traditional peer review systems as the rate and volume of scholarly communication increases. It is this continuing pressure that will ensure experimentation with new forms of peer review will continue with cooperation between research and publishing communities:

'[W]e detect a sense in which while publishers will continue to explore new approaches in the ways we have described, they would welcome more guidance from key sections of the research community on the kinds of peer review services they want from publishers, and on the purposes that they should seek to fulfil. Unless the purposes are defined with greater clarity than they are at present, at least some of the current experimentation may prove to be of little point.' Scholarly Communication and Peer Review: The Current Landscape and Future Trends, p.30. CC BY

The full report, Scholarly Communication and Peer Review: The Current Landscape and Future Trends, can be found here.

Charity alliance launches open access fund

An alliance of charities including Wellcome Trust, British Heart Foundation and Cancer Research UK has launched a fund to make charitably funded research immediately free to access and re-use. The Head of Digital Services at the Wellcome Trust said "This approach helps to ensure that this knowledge can be built upon and used in a manner that maximises health and public benefit."

The Charity Open Access Fund (COAF) will provide single combined block grants to UK research institutions to meet open access article processing charges for peer-reviewed research publications resulting from research funded by one or more of the six partner charities: Arthritis Research UK, Breast Cancer Campaign, the British Heart Foundation, Cancer Research UK, Leukaemia & Lymphoma Research and the Wellcome Trust.

The University of St Andrews already receives a block grant to support open access for Wellcome-funded research papers, and this joint fund will make it even easier to comply with these funders' open access policies.

For more information see the COAF frequently asked questions for researchers or contact the University Library's Open Access team.

For details on the existing criteria for Wellcome Trust funded authors, including the policy extension to cover monographs and book chapters from Oct 2014, see our Library web pages.

University of St Andrews APC data now available

Recently the Open Access and Repository Service Support Team has compiled information on APC spending. APC stands for Article Processing Charge, and this is the charge that applies for Gold open access publishing. In short, APCs cover the operating costs involved in the publication process that would have traditionally been covered by subscriptions.

University of St Andrews APC data 2013-2014.

The information is hosted on Figshare; a cloud-based online storage and distribution platform. This will ensure the data is widely and openly distributed to members of other institutions as well as our own. The spreadsheet lists publication level data which details how the University of St Andrews has spent centrally managed Open Access (OA) funds. Article Processing Charges (APCs) are reported from our RCUK and Wellcome Trust Block Grants, and from a small Library OA fund.

Universities are being encouraged to share data about the costs of Open Access publishing. We believe that sharing information helps the academic community to understand how publishing is changing in the new Open Access environment. For instance, we noted useful information about prepay schemes (these offer discounts as well as streamlining the payment process), as well as highlighting issues that arose during the Open Access payment process.

Open Access monograph - Wellcome Trust OA funding in action

Just a few weeks after the Wellcome Trust strengthened their open access policy to include monographs, the first OA monograph funded by the Trust has been published by Palgrave Macmillan.

Fungal Disease in Britain and the United States 1850-2000, by Dr Aya Homei and Professor Michael Worboys, is now available as a free ebook. See the full details, and download under a Creative Commons licence from http://www.palgraveconnect.com/pc/doifinder/10.1057/9781137377029

In an LSE blog post, the author stated:

We are delighted that our book is being published open access and feel that it will ensure that our subject, the history of fungal disease, will enjoy a much wider audience than would otherwise have been the case.

Professor Worboys goes on to describe the process as being the same as it would be for a print version, other than a little extra work on obtaining image permissions - none of which were refused. Sam Burridge of Palgrave Macmillan describes their approach to publishing open access across all their formats, and hopes this book will be the first of many.

Blog post: The Wellcome Trust funds its first open access monograph, helping medical humanities reach wider audiences

To build on the theme of this OA book, we took a look in Research@StAndrews:FullText and found this thesis - rather different in scope but of interest locally:

Patterson, Stephen (1989) The control of infectious diseases in Fife, c. 1855-1950

and via our Research@StAndrews portal we found this article, partially funded by Wellcome, and available free from Europe PMC:

Telford, J. C., Yeung, J. H. F., Xu, G., Kiefel, M. J., Watts, A. G., Hader, S., Chan, J., Bennet, A. J., Moore, M. M., & Taylor, G. L. (2011). The Aspergillus fumigatus sialidase is a KDNase: structural and mechanistic insights. Journal of Biological Chemistry, 286(12), 10783-10792

We hope it won't be long before we can add a Wellcome Trust-funded open access monograph to our collection!

Publisher extends open access choice to monographs

Scholars in Humanities and Social Sciences now have an opportunity to publish open access monographs with Brill’s new initiative:

“As a major publisher in the Humanities, Social Sciences, Biology and International Law, Brill is committed to enhancing access to academic content in any sustainable way. Since its academic book publications are a cornerstone of the program, it is extending Brill Open to include monographs and edited volumes.”

Under Brill's OA option, authors retain copyright and can choose from 2 Creative Commons licences (CC-BY / CC-BY-NC), determining whether commercial re-use is allowed and the cost of the Book Publication Charge. At EUR 5000 for a 350-page book under the CC-BY-NC licence, this ties in with the typical production costs mentioned by Open Book Publishers of £3,500-£5,000, and suggests that a business model for open access book publishing is achievable and affordable.

With the Wellcome Trust extending their open access policy to include scholarly monographs and book chapters* from October 2013 we are likely to see more publishers announcing their options for authors soon.

Previous blog post on examples of OA books and new publishing models

*Wellcome Trust's Monograph and Book Chapter FAQ

Major new open access journal publishes first articles

"eLife, the new open-access journal for outstanding scientific advancements, has published its first four research articles."

The new journal, backed by the Howard Hughes Medical Institute, the Max Planck Society, and the Wellcome Trust, is due to launch officially later this year. eLife aims to publish high quality papers 'without delay' and so has chosen to make its first open access articles available on PubMed Central and UKPMC. All articles and supplementary material in eLife will be available under a Creative Commons Attribution Licence allowing unrestricted re-use of the content provided the original source and authors are credited.

The journal is promoted as a researcher-driven initiative and innovative platform, using digital media and open access to maximise its impact. Publishing in eLife is currently free of charge to authors, and its open access model ensures research results are available to all potential readers without barriers.

http://www.elifesciences.org/ "Publishing is just the beginning"

Open Access message for Wellcome grant holders

Earlier this year there was news that the Wellcome Trust would be introducing a tougher stance on compliance with their open access policy, and they have now outlined the steps they will take:

The Wellcome Trust today announces that it will be strengthening the manner in which it enforces its open access policy with immediate effect. Failure to comply with the policy could result in final grant payments being withheld and non-compliant publications being discounted when applying for further funding.

The Guardian also reports on this new policy: Wellcome Trust to penalise scientists who don't embrace open access.

Support is available for St Andrews researchers who are in receipt of a Wellcome Trust grant. The Wellcome Trust has provided money to the University specifically to cover article fees for publishing in open access journals. The Trust also provides a list of frequently used journals with specific advice on how best to comply.

Spreading the word on public engagement

A group of researchers at St Andrews recently published an assessment of their public engagement activities in the open access journal PLoS ONE. One of the authors, Mark Bowler stated:

It's great to have it in a high impact open-access journal so that zoos can access it freely as well as universities.

Not only have they made sure that the results of their research can be accessed by anyone, the authors have promoted their work in a guest blog post for the Wellcome Trust: The Science of Public Engagement. The blog highlights the point that 'while assessment of engagement is increasingly a requirement for some funders, it is still far from the norm'. It also describes the continuing importance to researchers of having their research peer reviewed and published on a recognised platform.

See the article on the University of St Andrews Research portal and of course in our repository Research@StAndrews:FullText

Bowler, M., Buchanan-Smith, H., & Whiten, A. (2012). Assessing Public Engagement with Science in a University Primate Research Centre in a National Zoo PLoS ONE, 7(4) DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0034505
(This research was supported by a Wellcome Trust People Award to Prof Andy Whiten.)

Wellcome Trust Open Access funding

We have just completed our return to Wellcome detailing how our Open Access award was spent last year, and we have been notified of continued funding to support our researchers pay Open Access publishing costs.

The library has also introduced new procedures to manage this fund, and details have been circulated to Wellcome Trust grant recipients. You can find out more on our web pages.

The Wellcome Trust website provides useful Author FAQ and a summary of publisher policies to help you decide where to publish.

The UK PubMed Central blog has an interesting analysis of journals that have published Wellcome-funded research.