Monday, April 27, 2015

Peer Review Works, Says New Research on Citations and Patents

The Chronicle of Higher Education
April 23, 2015

The peer-review system is often described as the "gold standard" for determining scientific merit. A study published on Thursday gives that belief some empirical affirmation. 

The study shows that success rates of scientific projects, as measured by citations and patents, strongly correlate with the scores those projects were given under the peer-review process at the National Institutes of Health.

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Monday, April 6, 2015

Johns Hopkins Faces $1-Billion Lawsuit over U.S. Experiments in Guatemala

The Chronicle of Higher Education
April 2, 2015

Nearly 800 former research subjects and their families filed a billion-dollar lawsuit on Wednesday against the Johns Hopkins University, blaming the institution for its role in U.S.-government experiments in Guatemala in the 1940s that infected hundreds of people with sexually transmitted diseases, The Sun reported.
In an earlier lawsuit, the victims sought to hold top U.S. officials responsible, but a federal judge dismissed that case in 2012. The new lawsuit seeks to hold the university responsible because its doctors held key roles on panels that reviewed and approved federal spending on the experiments. The suit, filed in a state court in Baltimore, also names the Rockefeller Foundation and the drugmaker Bristol-Myers Squibb as defendants.

Thursday, April 2, 2015

Harvard Moves To Open Three New Offices Abroad

The Harvard Crimson
April 1, 2015

Harvard has authorized the formation of three new international offices in Cape Town, Beijing, and Mumbai, with each office in a different stage of development, according to Vice Provost for International Affairs Jorge I. Domínguez.

The Center for African Studies is expected to open an office in Cape Town, South Africa, by the end of 2015 or early 2016, according to Domínguez. An expected office in Beijing would  be connected to the existing Harvard Center Shanghai, and, if approved by the government of India, the Harvard School of Public Health will open an office in Mumbai. These offices would be used for research and academic work for Harvard affiliates in those regions.