e-research

Richard Lambert talks to the BBC about research and innovation

This post is all about initiatives to open up the silos of traditional academic research, by taking advantage of what the web can offer. I'll cover drivers, current projects and moves towards a new open way of sharing using the Web 2.0 ethos. The Times Higher supplement called "The Data Revolution" also covers this subject.

...'Supporting the science community and maintaining our excellent research base is critical to the UK's future economic growth and prosperity. This is why the government will invest a record level of almost £6 billion in UK science and research by 2011.' ......

So says Lord Drayson in the latest JISC Inform publication which is loaded with some interesting articles on moving research firmly into the 21^st C. There is a article & podcast by Professor Robert Darnton of Harvard University discussing their move to an Open Access policy.

JISC are also spending 10 Mi££ion on a 3 year e-research programme.

For those who are ne wto this area of Open Access, there was an open access week – supported online @ URL: http://www.openaccessweek.org/ , plus this 2007 paper on THE EMERGENCE OF OPEN EDUCATIONAL RESOURCES, will help contextualise the subject.



I've collated a number of established & new Open Access / research portals and repositories to give you an idea what innovations are already in operation;

• The Directory of Open Access Repositories - OpenDOAR
  
• Welcome to WIRE - Wolverhampton Intellectual Repository and E-Theses - an open access repository
  
• Welcome to Worcester Research and Publications
  
• Welcome to Association of Learning Technology Open Access Repository
  
• Pioneering collaboration between publishers, repositories and researchers – PEER (project)
  
• The Depot is an assured gateway to make your research Open Access – EDINA project
  
• JORUM is a free online repository service for teaching and support staff in UK Further and Higher Education Institutions
  
• EThOS aims to enable end-users to access the full text of electronically stored UK theses, in secure format, via a single Web interface.
• E-Evolve Repository. This repository is a free online service for UK Higher Education Institutions 
• The Academy Evidence Net - find current evidence relating to teaching and learning in Higher Education. 

Methods of giving busy academics "Web 2.0" spaces to share and collaborate over research projects are gaining popularity. Here are some I've stumbled across recently;

• Google knol – publish and share your research
  
• Concept Linkage In Knowledge Repositories – C-LINK
  
• Dr. Richard Price, post-doc, Philosophy Dept, Oxford University has started http://www.academia.edu/ - which looks very interesting
  
• myExperiment makes it easy to find, use and share
  scientific workflows and other Research Objects, and to build communities.
  
• The Teaching and Learning Research Programme database
  
• Participate is a large-scale research project, which explores at how we can use new and emerging technologies to encourage people to engage in environmental issues.
  
• Science Shops are not "shops" in the traditional sense of the word. They are small entities that carry out scientific research in a wide range of disciplines – usually free of charge. The Scienceshopswales is a good examples of what can be achieved with this micro (social) research model
  

This 21^st century open (web 2.0) ethos of sharing and collaborating is exemplified in the real world examples in the wikinomics (free ebook), of how modern business is responding and exploiting the networking afforded by Web 2.o social tools. And, if you want to get some pointers into communities of practice collaborating online, this new (free ebook) called The Art of the Community will help.