Research Pages

Niamh and Andrew are interviewed by Clare Baker from the Microbiology Society about their editorial on AI in Microbial Genomics research. Editorial on AI: https://www.microbiologyresearch.org/content/journal/mgen/10.1099/mgen.0.001049 Article for podcast: https://microbiologysociety.org/blog/microbe-talk-ai-a-useful-tool-or-dangerous-unstoppable-force.html

This episode was generated by ChatGPT 4, with the script read out by virtual voices. It is not our own words, but is a bit of fun nonetheless. In this episode, hosts virtual Andrew and virtual Niamh discuss the ethical considerations, best practices, potential risks, and benefits associated with using AI-generated content in academic research. Topics covered: Role of AI in academic research AI as a supportive tool Insights, suggestions, and idea generation Ethical considerations Plagiarism and intellectual property rights Bias in AI-generated content Authorship and responsibility Maintaining human judgment Best practices Using AI as a supportive tool Verifying originality and proper citation Acknowledging AI assistance Mitigating bias Maintaining human judgment Risks and benefits Risks: plagiarism, introduction of biases, compromised research quality, misattribution of authorship Benefits: increased efficiency, access to a broader range of information, assistance in generating ideas and writing, promoting collaboration and interdisciplinary research Key Takeaways: AI can be a valuable tool for academic research but should not replace human judgment and critical thinking. Researchers should be aware of the ethical considerations and adopt best practices when using AI-generated content. Understanding the potential risks and benefits can help researchers make responsible decisions when using AI-assisted research publishing.

It was announced that the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy has updated US policy guidance to make the results of taxpayer-supported research immediately available to the American public at no cost. We discuss this development in open research. Further information is available in this blog post by Niamh: https://unlockingresearch-blog.lib.cam.ac.uk/?p=3208

Some things drive us crazy about the current academic publishing system so we set out to reimagine the whole process.

When we publish papers we want to keep some sort of rights over that work, to allow us to comply with funder requirements. We discuss rights retention for academic publishing, what it is, and what it means.

We are back with Season 2 and chat with Andrew about what hes been up to for the past 2 years. Turns out its been a lot since hes been working on leading a group sequencing SARS-CoV-2. Details of Andrews work: https://quadram.ac.uk/case_studies/genome-sequencing-sars-cov-2-plays-a-critical-role-in-informing-national-and-international-covid-19-public-health-responses/

We discuss SARS-CoV-2 'new variants' and try to clear up some of the confusion around all the names flying around. Hopefully this helps to give some insights into the various names you hear, but probably by the time you listen the whole thing will have changed again since this field moves so rapidly. Andrew apologises in advance for all the errors that will be found in this podcast! If you want to read a bit more theres an interesting news item on Nature: www.nature.com/articles/d41586-021-00097-w

The process of writing a scientific paper can be complex with lots of little details nobody tells you about. We discuss how it all works practically, from the inception of an idea to getting your paper into review.

We discuss different resources used in research: databases such as free ones like Google Scholar and Pubmed to paid databases, author profiles such as ORCID, and the pros and cons of them. See @research-pages (https://soundcloud.com/research-pages) for all of our other episodes.

Reference managers can save you a lot of time and energy when writing papers, but are an often overlooked tool. We look into what they actually are, why we need them, our own experiences with a variety of different reference managers, and some of the pros and cons. See https://soundcloud.com/research-pages for all of our other episodes.

Reproducing results from scientific papers can be a challenge. Using bioinformatics as an example, we discuss how to make it easier to reproduce results, covering: pipelines, compute, software, storage, and metadata. See https://soundcloud.com/research-pages for all of our other episodes

We discuss DORA (Declaration on Research Assessment) and its impact on Researchers, Publishers, metrics providers, Institutions and funders.

In this show we discuss academic peer review: what is peer review and why its important, how it works from a reviewers perspective, open versus blind review, why its a good thing, what a reviewer gets out of the process, the cost of Knowledge campaign and peer review systems (websites).

This podcast discusses why academic research groups need information professionals covering: busting sterotypes, different types of information professionals, sharing what information professionals do, embedded librarians, managing data itself and the right tool for the job.