Blog Buzz: February 4 – February 10

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Causing some buzz this week;

New guidelines from ASCO suggest palliative care be combined with oncology practice earlier on in metastatic disease

This piece in LibraryJournal thanks the AAP and the Research Works Act for getting scholars energized about open access. Meanwhile, a new congressional bill called the Federal Research Public Access Act (or FRPAA) would expand current open access policies. Evolutionary biologist and open access advocate Michael Eisen weighs in.

Tech Review reports that Europeans Protest ACTA

Lots of bloggers are reflecting on the Komen/Planned Parenthood rift. Matthew Herper of Forbes says to restore their reputation, Komen should research new drugs, and you can read former Komen SVP Karen Handel’s resignation letter here.

In social media news: Path, Pinterest and some big mistakes!

Web of Knowledge New Enhancement

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Web of Knowledge has launched a new enhancement on its platform to make navigating searches and citation paths easier.

New features include:

  • A simplified display of the Lookup Table makes it easier to view and identify relevant results.
  • Additional information displayed in the Citation Report allows you to gain more context from your results.
  • Use the Advanced Search to search by accession number or ISSN or export them from the Marked List.
  • Search a broad set of data across a subject area using the Advanced Search. The Subject Area field can be found in all of the databases across the new Web of Knowledge.
  • Quickly and simply disambiguate authors with common names with the newly enhanced Author Finder.

More information about the new release can be found here.

Blog Buzz: January 29 – February 3

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Another week of big waves out on the blogs and Twitter…

The rumble about open access, the proposed Research Works Act and a growing boycott of Elsevier by some academics continues in a few related items: As Journal Boycott Grows, Elsevier Defends Its Practices, reports the Chronicle of Higher Education (via @Mandosally); KraftyLibrarian asks if a boycott of Elsevier can really be successful in the biomedical field in Elsevier Boycott, My Thoughts; and in a post that  begins with Monty Python but is serious, David Dobbs asks, Is the Open Science Revolution for Real?

The NY Times reported on the Uproar as Komen Foundation Cuts Money to Planned Parenthood and the Atlantic said Top Susan G. Komen Official Resigned Over Planned Parenthood Cave-in. Now, after a week of impassioned public debate, Komen has reversed its decision.

There are proposals in both houses for legislative changes to the FDA.  Here are reports on how increased funding could speed discovery and approval of new drugs and ease drug shortages.

And just for fun this week, a fifth grader has discovered a new molecule and been published and there is a free collection of silhouettes of organisms called PhyloPic!