Do synthesis centers synthesize? A semantic analysis of topical diversity in research.

Synthesis centers are a form of scientific organization that catalyzes and supports research that integrates diverse theories, methods and data across spatial or temporal scales to increase the generality, parsimony, applicability, or empirical soundness of scientific explanations. Synthesis working groups are a distinctive form of scientific collaboration that produce consequential, high-impact publications. But no one has asked if synthesis working groups synthesize: are their publications substantially more diverse than others, and if so, in what ways and with what effect? We investigate these questions by using Latent Dirichlet Analysis to compare the topical diversity of papers published by synthesis center collaborations with that of papers in a reference corpus. Topical diversity was operationalized and measured in several ways, both to reflect aggregate diversity and to emphasize particular aspects of diversity (such as variety, evenness, and balance). Synthesis center publications have greater topical variety and evenness, but less disparity, than do papers in the reference corpus. The influence of synthesis center origins on aspects of diversity is only partly mediated by the size and heterogeneity of collaborations: when taking into account the numbers of authors, distinct institutions, and references, synthesis center origins retain a significant direct effect on diversity measures. Controlling for the size and heterogeneity of collaborative groups, synthesis center origins and diversity measures significantly influence the visibility of publications, as indicated by citation measures. We conclude by suggesting social processes within collaborations that might account for the observed effects, by inviting further exploration of what this novel textual analysis approach might reveal about interdisciplinary research, and by offering some practical implications of our results.

Spatially explicit data: stewardship and ethical challenges in science.

Scholarly communication is at an unprecedented turning point created in part by the increasing saliency of data stewardship and data sharing. Formal data management plans represent a new emphasis in research, enabling access to data at higher volumes and more quickly, and the potential for replication and augmentation of existing research. Data sharing has recently transformed the practice, scope, content, and applicability of research in several disciplines, in particular in relation to spatially specific data. This lends exciting potentiality, but the most effective ways in which to implement such changes, particularly for disciplines involving human subjects and other sensitive information, demand consideration. Data management plans, stewardship, and sharing, impart distinctive technical, sociological, and ethical challenges that remain to be adequately identified and remedied. Here, we consider these and propose potential solutions for their amelioration.

Pathways for diversifying and enhancing science advocacy.

Science is under attack and scientists are becoming more involved in efforts to defend it. The rise in science advocacy raises important questions regarding how science mobilization can both defend science and promote its use for the public good while also including the communities that benefit from science. This article begins with a discussion of the relevance of science advocacy. It then reviews research pointing to how scientists can sustain, diversify, and increase the political impact of their mobilization. Scientists, we argue, can build and maintain politically impactful coalitions by engaging with and addressing social group differences and diversity instead of suppressing them. The article concludes with a reflection on how the study of science-related mobilization would benefit from further research.

Understanding life together: a brief history of collaboration in biology.

The history of science shows a shift from single-investigator 'little science' to increasingly large, expensive, multinational, interdisciplinary and interdependent 'big science'. In physics and allied fields this shift has been well documented, but the rise of collaboration in the life sciences and its effect on scientific work and knowledge has received little attention. Research in biology exhibits different historical trajectories and organisation of collaboration in field and laboratory - differences still visible in contemporary collaborations such as the Census of Marine Life and the Human Genome Project. We employ these case studies as strategic exemplars, supplemented with existing research on collaboration in biology, to expose the different motives, organisational forms and social dynamics underpinning contemporary large-scale collaborations in biology and their relations to historical patterns of collaboration in the life sciences. We find the interaction between research subject, research approach as well as research organisation influencing collaboration patterns and the work of scientists.

Characterizing a scientific elite: the social characteristics of the most highly cited scientists in environmental science and ecology.

In science, a relatively small pool of researchers garners a disproportionally large number of citations. Still, very little is known about the social characteristics of highly cited scientists. This is unfortunate as these researchers wield a disproportional impact on their fields, and the study of highly cited scientists can enhance our understanding of the conditions which foster highly cited work, the systematic social inequalities which exist in science, and scientific careers more generally. This study provides information on this understudied subject by examining the social characteristics and opinions of the 0.1% most cited environmental scientists and ecologists. Overall, the social characteristics of these researchers tend to reflect broader patterns of inequality in the global scientific community. However, while the social characteristics of these researchers mirror those of other scientific elites in important ways, they differ in others, revealing findings which are both novel and surprising, perhaps indicating multiple pathways to becoming highly cited.