Communities Happenings is a weekly post with news of interest to NPG’s online communities. The aim is to provide this info in one handy summary. Listings include tweetups and conferences that we’re attending and/or organising as well as new online tools, products or cool videos. We also occasionally flag up NPG special offers and competitions plus updates about NPG social media activities such as new accounts you might want to follow. Do let us know what you find most useful!
A special SoNYC
February’s SoNYC is a super social media week special event at the American Museum of Natural History! Please join us on Thursday February 16th, in person or online, via the social media week livestream to discuss Beyond a Trend: Enhancing Science Communication with Social Media.
As a communications tool, social media is an undeniably effective way to enhance your message. But within the science realm, top communicators – both academic and professional – strive to use social media for something greater: to engage the public in a conversation about science. Never before has it been so easy for researchers, public information officers, educators, students, and journalists to talk directly to the public about the benefits, limits, and implications of scientific knowledge. Social media not only makes these meaningful conversations possible, but it often also makes them fun and compelling. During this session, hear from scientists, communicators, and educators who use social media tools and the philosophy behind them to find creative, collaborative, and engaging learning opportunities.
This month’s panel:
– American Museum of Natural History educators who are developing a “tool kit” of mobile apps, websites and more to help middle school students collect, share and present data on urban biodiversity
– Ben Lillie, the co-organizer of The Story Collider, which tells science stories by combining verbal narratives with podcasts, Twitter and an online magazine
– Matt Danzico, a BBC journalist who conducted a 365-day blog experiment called “The Time Hack” looking at how we perceive time
– Carl Zimmer, a science journalist whose latest book, Science Ink: Tattoos of the Science Obsessed, is based on feedback he received on his Discover Magazine blog when he asked the question: are scientists hiding tattoos of their science?
– Moderator: Jennifer Kingson, day assignment editor, Science Department, The New York Times
The event is free to attend with an opportunity to meet the panellists and other attendees afterwards. If you’d like to follow the vocal online discussion (we average around 600 tweets per SoNYC event), keep an eye on the #sonyc hashtag or check back here for our write-up and Storify of the online conversations. Do also keep an eye on the official Twitter account for more details.
This week has seen the launch of more NPG accounts on Twitter:
NaturePhotonics – Nature Photonics is a monthly journal which publishes top-quality, peer-reviewed research in all areas of light generation, manipulation and detection.
NatureOutlook – Nature Outlooks are supplements to Nature, filled with news, features and comment about issues of scientific interest.
APB_Neuro – Action Potential is a forum operated by neuroscience editors @noahWG & @ih_C_hi at Nature. They’ll discuss what’s new and exciting in neuroscience, publishing & policy.
You can also find a full Twitter list of NPG journals and products here.
A new Scilogs blog
We would like to wish a warm welcome to a new blog run by the Max Planck Institute for Human Cognitive and Brain Sciences, which began on the Scilogs blogging network this week. NeuroCognition will provide insights into what scientists have on their minds. Posts may feature new studies, ideas, projects and initiatives, comments on current debates, conference reports, plus lots more. Their first post looks at brain waves:
Can you hear your own brain? Of course, you cannot. I nevertheless find myself returning to this fascinating play of thought. We often talk of “brain waves”. This is most likely inspired by the old images of electroencephalographs (“EEG”) that recorded electrical voltage changes straight from a participant’s scalp and scribbled them onto meter-long papers. Here is a picture from Berger’s famous first publications in the late 1920s:
We encourage you to check out the rest of the post.
Congratulations
We would like to congratulate this month’s Nature Network blogger who has qualified for a free 3 month subscription to Nature.
Well done to Anne-Marie Hodge – keep up the great blogging!
Our recognition system for Nature Network bloggers is open to any blogger who publishes a minimum of 1 post per week/4 blog posts per month in a given calendar month. For those bloggers who haven’t qualified, do not be disheartened as there is always next month. You can check out the guidelines here.
SLAS Conference and Exhibition
Nature will be in sunny San Diego, California this week for the Society for Laboratory Automation and Screening meeting:
SLAS2012 unites the scientific savvy, technical innovation and energy of the former LabAutomation and SBS conferences to increase collaboration and prominence for the laboratory science and technology community. SLAS2012 brings together leaders in the scientific community working in drug discovery and development efforts, as well as clinical diagnostics, food and agricultural sciences, forensics and security sciences, petrochemicals and energy, and consumer products.
Come by to Booth #209 to say hello, and pick up free journals! (Also, ask about our conference discounts- 30% off Nature, and 20% of all other Nature Publishing Group journals.)
NPG offers further open access options
Nature Publishing Group (NPG) is pleased to announce an expansion in open access among its society-owned titles. A new open access journal, Molecular Therapy – Nucleic Acids, has now launched at www.nature.com/mtna. In addition, Clinical Pharmacology & Therapeutics and Spinal Cord now offer open access options. Authors publishing original research in CPT and Spinal Cord can opt to pay an APC to make their paper open access immediately on publication. Martin Delahunty, Associate Director, Academic Journals & Pharma Solutions, NPG, explains:
“Open access has been central to NPG’s growth over the last two years so we are pleased to be expanding open access options among our society titles. We are also delighted to welcome Molecular Therapy – Nucleic Acids to our growing catalog of society titles.”
You can find out more in the official press release here.
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