Data issues in the life sciences

We review technical and sociological issues facing the Life Sciences as they transform into more data-centric disciplines - the "Big New Biology". Three major challenges are: 1) lack of comprehensive standards; 2) lack of incentives for individual scientists to share data; 3) lack of appropriate infrastructure and support. Technological advances with standards, bandwidth, distributed computing, exemplar successes, and a strong presence in the emerging world of Linked Open Data are sufficient to conclude that technical issues will be overcome in the foreseeable future. While motivated to have a shared open infrastructure and data pool, and pressured by funding agencies in move in this direction, the sociological issues determine progress. Major sociological issues include our lack of understanding of the heterogeneous data cultures within Life Sciences, and the impediments to progress include a lack of incentives to build appropriate infrastructures into projects and institutions or to encourage scientists to make data openly available.     

广东土壤科学的发展历程与展望

土壤是农业生产的基础,是人类赖以生存的基石,也是人类食物与生态环境安全的保障。土壤学是解决人口-资源-环境-粮食矛盾的重要学科之一。广东土壤科学发展历史悠久,在食物安全、环境保护、减少贫困、退化土地恢复重建和生态系统稳定性维持等事关全省发展方面取得了许多重要的成绩,但目前我省面临着人均耕地面积少、后备土壤资源匮乏、土壤肥力下降、土壤环境日趋恶化以及水土流失依然严重等问题,因此我省土壤科学研究也将从生产农学和基础土壤发生学拓展到包括高效持续农业生产、土壤变化与全球气候变化相互关系、土壤可持续利用、数字化与信息化土壤、土壤污染监测及其修复等多功能的研究领域。     

Witnessing the advance of science and technology in life sciences in the new era

正Since the launch in 1950,Science China Series and Science Bulletin have published numerous significant scientific achievements,witnessing the development of science and technology in China and serving as a bridge connecting Chinese scientists with their counterparts in the international scientific community.     

Randomized controlled experiments in health and social sciences: Some conceptual issues

This brief article outlines some difficulties as well as benefits in conducting randomized controlled trials in social science settings especially in developing countries. Some of the historical developments are summarized and certain applications in health sciences are discussed from methodological and policy standpoints.     

The replicability crisis in science and protected area research: Poor practices and potential solutions

The reliability of some published research from well-funded disciplines of medicine and psychology has been brought into question. This is because some researchers failed to achieve consistent results after replicating published studies using the same methodology. Researchers have referred to this as the ‘replicability in science crisis’ and have identified several practices contributing to unreliable science. Protected area and other conservation researchers are unlikely to be immune from these poor practices given they use the same scientific approaches as other disciplines. Fortunately, there are solutions to the poor practices contributing to unreliable science. In this paper I identify those poor practices and describe solutions as identified by researchers from a range of disciplines. These solutions are transferable to protected area science and related conservation disciplines. Most solutions are not costly or demanding to implement. Adopting these solutions can improve the reliability of both published and unpublished research.