Working Scientist

Simon Hettrick tells Julie Gould about the role of research software engineers, what they do and how you can become one.In the third episode of our six-part podcast series on workplace technology, we learn more about the importance of coding for scientists followed by an introduction to the work of research software engineers.Simon Hettrick, deputy director of the UK Software Sustainability Institute, tells Julie Gould about the typical career path of a research software engineer, and how their skills can support researchers with limited coding skills.Harriet Alexander starts the programme by telling Nature technology editor Jeff Perkel about her role as an instructor for Software Carpentry, a global non-profit organisation which teaches research computing skills to scientists. Who typically attends a Carpentry course and what do they learn during a workshop?Alexander, a postdoctoral fellow in oceanography bioinformatics at the University of California, Davis, also tells us about the recent course she ran in Antarctica. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Learning how to coding brings career benefits and helps science by aiding reproducibility, Julie Gould discovers.Jessica Hedge tells Julie Gould about how she learned to code as a PhD student, and the freedom and flexibility it provides to manage large datasets."I never saw myself as a coder and it took me a long time to realise I had to pick up the skills myself," she tells Julie Gould in the second episode of this six-part series about technology and scientific careers. "A colleague was using Python and R and I saw the potential." What is her advice to other early career researchers who are keen to develop coding expertise?Also, Brian MacNamee, an assistant professor in the school of computer science at University College Dublin, talks about the college's data science course and how it can benefit both humanities and science students.Finally, Nature technology editor Jeffrey Perkel describes how coding can help with computational reproducibility. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Mark Dodgson and Lee Cronin discuss the revolutionary potential of artificial intelligence on university teaching, research, and scientific careers.Artificial intelligence (AI) has been hailed as the "fourth Industrial Revolution," a disruptive technology set to transform world economies and the traditional workplace. But how will AI and deep learning affect the future of universities, the very institutions that developed the technology in the first place?Kicking off this six-part Working Scientist podcast series on technology and scientific careers, Mark Dodgson, professor of innovation studies at the University of Queensland Business School and a visiting professor at Imperial College London, predicts how AI could change university teaching, how institutions measure student performance, and how they conduct scientific research."Unless universities get pretty coherent strategies to deal with this technology, they will struggle" he warns.But Lee Cronin, regius chair of chemistry at the University of Glasgow, Scotland, disagrees."There's no magic in AI," he argues. "It's just a tool, a series of mathematical processes that allows you to extract meaning, or some degree of meaning, from large data sets."Addressing the technology's potential impact on teaching, Cronin adds: "If we want to use AI as a tool to basically make grading cheaper, then fine, do that."But universities aren't about grading. They are about educating people to think critically, about preparing people with sufficient high level skills to add to the economy and be creative."The thing I really love about our universities is their creativity. There's no AI that can assess creativity. There just isn't."Finally, Nature technology editor Jeffrey Perkel describes how technology underpins the entire scientific enterprise, pointing to some of the most popular topics covered in his section recently, including a feature on deep learning for biology. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

China's investment in materials science makes it an attractive destination for young foreign researchers looking to relocate, with decent salaries and facilities that many western universities would envy.John Plummer, senior portfolio editor for Nature Research and a former senior editor for Nature Materials, based in Shanghai, says this investment is driven by the Chinese government's desire to deliver cutting-edge research and raise the living standard of people living in rural areas.The challenge, as with other parts of the world, is to give researchers independence and time to innovate, rather than face pressure to publish, and to deliver a quick return on investment, he adds.Xin Li, associate editor of Nature Materials, also based in Shanghai, describes China's technology transfer environment and how the country's lab culture compares to labs in the west.Finally, Plummer speculates on the likely impact of the current trade war between the US and China have on research collaboration and innovation.Nature Briefing Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Many grant funding decisions are random, with luck playing a large part. How can the system be improved, particularly when funds are tight? In the final episode of our six-part series on funding, Feric Fang, a professor in the departments of laboratory medicine and microbiology at the University of Washington, Seattle, describes how a two-tier "modified lottery" could be a fairer process, with grants randomly prioritised to applications that had some merit but did not attract funding first time round.New Zealand's Health Research Council already operates a similar system, says Vernon Choy, the council's direct of research investments and contracts.Its Explorer Grants panel does not discuss rankings but instead judges if an application's proposals are viable and if they meet an agreed definition of "transformative." These applications then go into a pool and a random number generator is applied to to allocate funding based on the budget available.Because applications are anonymised, Choy says there is no bias against a particular institution or research team, allowing young and inexperienced researchers to compete more fairly against senior colleagues.Johan Bollen, a professor at Indiana University's school of informatics, computing and engineering, describes how a Self Organising Funding Allocation system (SOFA) would work, removing the burden of writing grant applications."What if we just give everybody a pot of money at the beginning of the year and then redistribute a certain percentage to others?" he asks.Paid content: European Research Council"We are open to the world" says ERC president Jean-Pierre Bourguignon. Its grantees straddle 80 nationalities and the organisation has signed collaboration agreements with 11 countries, including China, India, Brazil, Australia and Japan.Helen Tremlett, who leads the pharmacoepidemiology in multiple sclerosis research group at the University of British Colombia, Canada, spent time in the lab of an ERC grantee at the Max Planck Institute in Munich, Germany. This experience, along with publication of a 2011 paper in Nature looking at how the gut microbiome may be influential in triggering the animal model of MS, had career-changing consequences, leading her down a new research path. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Julie Gould asks how early career researchers can develop their careers in the face of funding's "boom and bust" cycle and the short-termism it engenders.Governments are swayed by political uncertainty and technological developments, argues Michael Teitelbaum, author of Falling Behind?Boom, Bust, and the Global Race for Scientific Talent.In the US, for example, space research funding dramatically increased after Soviet Russia launched the Sputnik 1 satellite in 1957, ending after the 1969 moon landing.Similar booms followed in the 1970s, 80s, and 90s, says Teitelbaum, a Wertheim Fellow in the Labor and Worklife Program at Harvard Law School and senior advisor to the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation in New York.But he argues that they are unsustainable and can have a negative impact on the careers of junior scientists and their research. Will Brexit trigger a funding downturn, and if so, for how long? Watch this space, says Teitelbaum. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In April 2018 the UK's funding environment was transformed with the launch of UK Research and Innovation, an umbrella agency which oversees more than £6 billion (US$7.4 billion) of research funding per year, led by Sir Mark Walport, formerly the UK government's chief scientific adviser.In episode four of this six-part series on funding, Julie Gould discusses the changes with James Wilsdon, professor of research policy at the University of Sheffield, UK. Wilsdon describes how the new funding landscape compares to the previous structure of seven research councils, how UKRI can support interdisciplinary and trans-disciplinary research, and what this new funding landscape means for early career researchers. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Expert advice on how to get the details of a grant submission right, and planning for "curveball questions" if you are asked to deliver an oral presentation:Peter Gorsuch, Chief Editor at Nature Research Editing Services, tells Julie Gould about the all-important details to include in your grant application.Jernej Zupanc, who runs visual communication skills training for scientists, talks fonts, colours and other ways make your application easier to navigate.Anne-Marie Coriat, Head of UK and Europe Research Landscape at Wellcome Trust, London, describes how to prepare for an oral presentation, including answers to some difficult questions.Paid content: European Research CouncilRomanian researcher Alina Bădescu describes her experience of successfully applying for an ERC grant. Bădescu, an associate professor at the Faculty of Electronic, Telecommunications and Information Technology, University of Bucharest, also talks about the second-stage interview process run by the ERC at its HQ in Brussels. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

It's best to start planning for a grant application at least 9-12 months before the submission deadline, says Anne Marie Coriat, Head of UK and Europe Research Landscape at Wellcome Trust, London. She outlines the preparatory steps you need to take.Also in the second episode of this six-part podcast series on funding, Peter Gorsuch, Chief Editor at Nature Research Editing Services, highlights the importance of your grant application summary statement. A clearly worded document can help to convince a funding panel that you are the right person for a grant, he says.Paid contentThis episode concludes with a second sponsored slot featuring the work of the European Research Council (ERC). Alejandro Martin Hobday, who manages the unit in charge of receiving applications and coordinating the ERC's two-stage evaluation process, describes how his team supports both successful and unsuccessful applicants.And panel chair Maria Leptin, a research scientist at the University of Cologne and director of the European Molecular Biology Organisation in Heidelberg, Germany, explains how she and her expert colleagues evaluate individual applications. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this first episode of a six-part weekly series about funding, Julie Gould outlines the US National Institutes of Health's (NIH) grant review process and the extent to which reviewers evaluating the same applications agree or disagree. Is the current system the best way, she asks Elizabeth Pier, lead author of a March 2018 paper published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, Low agreement among reviewers evaluating the same NIH grant applications.Paid contentThis episode concludes with a slot sponsored by the European Research Council. Jean-Pierre Bourguignon, its president, outlines the organisation's role and remit as a grant funder. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.