‘Now, more than ever, we need science’, thinks the editor of this blogpost as he works from his small studio paid by a rent-burdened academic salary while under lockdown in California due to the COVID-19 pandemic. However, the need for an open, fair, inclusive science seems to be ignored all across the world by policy makers and university administrations, who refuse to pay graduate st ...[Read More]
The Role of Geosciences in Exoplanet Science
How can geoscience methods be incorporated into the research of extrasolar planets? These are planets that are beyond our own solar system and their geological properties are mostly unknown. Kaustubh Hakim is a postdoctoral researcher at the Center for Space and Habitability in Bern, Switzerland where he studies the interiors of rocky exoplanets and geochemical cycles using theory and lab experime ...[Read More]
Is the scientific community ready for open access publishing?
How much we pay, as both scientists and the public, for publishing and accessing papers is a hot topic right across the academic community – and rightly so. Publishing houses, and their fees, are big, big business. To which journal we should submit our work is a regular decision we face. But what are the Green, Golden or Hybrid roads? How do pre- and post-prints fit into the journey? In this ...[Read More]
Space travel: arrogance or vision?
This week, Caroline Dorn, Ambizione Fellow at the University of Zurich, tells us her view on space travel and why we shouldn’t pack our bags just yet. Space exploration is experiencing a new boom, a come-back since the 60s & 70s! First discoveries of planets outside our solar system in the 90s have set the foundations of a new discipline that is exoplanet science – the field in wh ...[Read More]