Overall, women receive a smaller share of research funding – but it’s not due to how applications are weighed up. The problem starts with the workforce itself.
Researchers are key to Canada’s capacity to create a high-tech economy, build the biomedical sector and seed entrepreneurial activity, but they can’t do it without research funding.
The Coalition government showed a disdain for the arts, humanities and social sciences. The plight of these disciplines requires action from the incoming Labor government on three fronts.
A Senate committee is discussing a bill designed to shore up the independence of the Australian Research Council, after recent high-profile cases of ministers vetoing research grants.
Decisions on research funding are too complex for a pub test. Assessing grant applications requires a high level of expertise and diligence, which the minister simply disregarded.
After years of government rhetoric about boosting the commercial benefits from university research, Australia’s record is still among the worst in the developed world.
Expectations that academics raise funds themselves and aim to publish in certain ‘quality’ publications are shaping research and where it is published.
The rejection culture of academia is damaging. Rejections are inevitable, but there are better ways of managing the process that don’t leave individuals to bear the whole burden of coping.
With a threatening virus sweeping the world, research efforts across sectors have ground to a halt. But one thing is clear: the non-scientific community has never valued research more.
With limited resources and inadequate infrastructure, African universities appear to be under tremendous strain. But some are beating the odds and getting it right.
Evaluation is a critical tool for decisions on improving performance. It also assures that African universities are getting value for money from grants, donations and the like.
Tensions between the government and the university sector ran high in 2018, with the government cutting funding to student places and research and a big push back from universities.
It is easy to see the benefits from the advances we have made in physics, chemistry, engineering, computer science and the life sciences. Without these impressive leaps in understanding, we would not have…
New studies on the quality of published research shows we could be wasting billions of dollars a year on bad science, to the neglect of good science projects.
The traditional starting point for considering the scientific impact of research are its citations. But judging which research applications should be funded is a very inexact science.
The government’s announcement of a national science strategy is good for Australia, particularly for promoting engagement between science and industry.
Director, Walter and Eliza Hall Institute & Professor of Medical Biology, and an honorary principal fellow in the Department of Zoology at the University of Melbourne, WEHI (Walter and Eliza Hall Institute of Medical Research)