Today marks a pretty exciting day for all of us here at ResearchGate HQ. We’re welcoming our two millionth member to the network and we couldn’t be happier about it.

Back in May 2008 a few curious researchers logged onto the newly launched ResearchGate and were obviously as convinced as we were that this was something big. They invited their colleagues, collaborated, and built strong connections that kept them coming back. Needless to say we happily and steadily grew.

Now, roughly four years and a few months later (okay, it’s been 1,580 days. Yes, we’ve been counting) two million researchers are using the network to publish their work, share their results, and build their reputation. Throughout this time we’ve heard some amazing stories that we’d like to share with you, stories about discovery, scientific progress, and of course, friendship.

Rafael Luque, Professor of Organic Chemistry at Universidad de Córdoba in Spain, signed up to ResearchGate in September 2008, and found an unlikely co-author in Rick Arneil Aracon, a graduate of Xavier University, Philippines. Together, they developed a highly efficient, eco-friendly and low-cost catalyst for biofuels made from corn cob residues. In September 2013, Rick will join Rafael’s lab in Cordoba as a PhD student.

Orazio Romeo, a mycologist from the Università degli Studi di Messina in Italy and Emmanuel Nnadi, microbiologist at the University of Jos in Nigeria also met in a topic discussion on the network. Together they discovered the first occurrence of a pathogenic yeast in Nigeria. Emmanuel visited us at our headquarters when he was in Berlin for a conference this summer.

David Chau is one of our most recent users. He stumbled into a discussion that had a huge impact on his current project. Through ResearchGate, he managed to connect with colleagues from different departments within his university and, as a result, gain access to equipment for the experiments he was conducting. He is now working on an innovative technique to detect tiny quantities of water in biological samples. Sadly, we can’t tell you more… There could very well be a patent pending.

So on this very special day, we’d like to say to all our members: thank you for being part of our story.

Here’s to many more years of discovery, progress, and innovation.

Do you have an RG tale you’d like to tell? Drop us a line. We’d love to hear from you.

Happy birthday to us!

Today, ResearchGate celebrates its fourth year of existence. And we couldn't be happier!

To mark the occasion, we ventured out into the bright and sunny Berlin afternoon and each set a balloon soaring up into the sky! 

Check out our little video to see the whole thing in action. 

And to prove just how far we've come, here's a vintage screenshot: ResearchGate's very first home page. 



Thank you to all our members, and to everyone who's been a part of this incredible journey. 

Here's to many more years of progress and innovation!

Yesterday was a big day for all of us at ResearchGate HQ. We were very pleased to be able to announce the completion of our series B investment round, led by Luke Nosek of the prestigious Founders Fund.

The investment will allow us to continue to grow as a company and as a network while pursuing new innovations. We have big plans for the site and science as a whole. And we can’t wait to share them all with you.

Thank you for being part of ResearchGate: your continued support and feedback have been invaluable.

Let’s change science together,

The ResearchGate Team

You can find more information on the announcement here:

Press Release
GigaOm
VentureBeat
Financial Times

Bastian Hofmann, one of ResearchGate’s very own software engineers, will be sharing his technical know-how at two upcoming developer conferences:

PHP Conference 2011 - at Rheingoldhalle - Mainz on the 10th and 11th of October. 

Web Dev Con - at the Intercontinental - Hamburg on the 17th and 18th of October. 

As an advocate of cross-platform web development, Bastian is committed to raising awareness of OpenSocial. In addition to his work at ResearchGate, Bastian is a committer and PMC member at the Apache Shindig Poject and a participant in the OpenSocial Foundation. 

A frequent speaker at conferences throughout the world, Bastian recently presented at the world-renowned open source convention OsCon in Portland, Oregon, where he covered advanced techniques for modern web applications using JavaScript. Bastian’s upcoming presentation will focus on OpenSocial, JavaScript mashups, Oauth, OpenID and other online identity management solutions.

As always, we’ve been hard at work on some site updates. We think there’s a few you might be interested in:

It’s now easier than ever before to log in to ResearchGate with your Facebook account: one click is all it takes. ResearchGate will even connect you with those of your Facebook friends who are already part of the ResearchGate community.

We want you to get the most out of ResearchGate; we’ve added a new contact suggestion tool to make connecting and collaborating with friends, colleagues and related researchers even more straightforward. Here’s how to get there: Home Feed » Under ‘Related Researchers’ on the right-hand side » Click ‘Show more’ From there you’ll be able to browse suggestions based on your institution, researchers you might know, people with similar research to you and people working in your field. 

As always, if you have any ideas or feedback let us know!

Add us on Facebook 

Follow us on Twitter

Or send us a message via our contact form.

One million members, one million researchers, one million brains.

A pretty smart guy once said: ‘it is good to rub and polish our brain against that of others’. - Michel de Montaigne

We think these are wise words indeed.

Today marks a milestone in the history of ResearchGate: over one million users are now networking, collaborating and sharing knowledge through our platform.

To connect one million people is to connect the potential of one million brains. One lone brain is already quite impressive; as proof we decided to put together a few facts on what it can do and what makes it tick:

• Our brains experience on average 70,000 thoughts each day.  Imagine that.

• A brain generates around 20 watts of power daily. That’s about enough to power a light bulb. Or a lot of ideas.

• 750 - 1,000 ml of blood flow through the brain every minute. You could fill 3 soda cans with all that. But it probably wouldn’t be as nice as a cold cola.

• There are 100,000 miles of blood vessels in the brain. About enough to circle the earth three times. Could get a bit messy though.

• 100 billion neurons go into making our brain what it is. Roughly the same amount as there are stars in our galaxy. That’s pretty mind-blowing.

If this is just one brain, imagine what one million could do together.

1,000,000 is a big number.  And we’re just getting started.

Network Updates

As part of our continued commitment to an improved user experience, we’re always on the lookout for those little changes that can make a big difference: here are some of the most recent updates.

We’ve cleaned up the visual design of our Research Blog and your personal blog. The Research Blog is always on the lookout for quality posts from the ResearchGate community, so why not submit something today?

We’ve done some behind-the-scenes work to make it faster and easier to fulfill your full text requests.

Posting a job to Research Jobs just got easier.  Make your listing and start recruiting from over 900,000 researchers from around the world today!

Getting your colleagues to join ResearchGate is now much more straightforward: we’ve streamlined the invitation function to make the process quicker. If you have any feedback or ideas let us know!

Add us on Facebook

Follow us on Twitter

Or send us a message via our contact form.

As a user of the ResearchGate network you'll have noticed that we've had a massive update in the way the platform looks and operates. As it is in science, a greater level of organization results in a greater level of productivity; the new design is intended to make site navigation simpler and more efficient, improving access to the information that is valuable to you and making it easier for you to contribute to the research community.  The website is a combination of the strongest elements of the previous design with an improved functionality.

The tools that you use on a regular basis like the literature search, groups, file sharing, micro-feed, and job search are all still there, but we are continuously working on how we can optimize the way you use them and how their function can improved.  These changes are based on feedback we've received from you as well as ideas we've had that we will enhance the network.  Over the next couple of weeks we'll go through how the new features have been implemented into the network and how you can get the most out of them.

It's an exciting time at ResearchGate, and as always we value your feedback and invite your questions as we progress.

Members can Communicate more Efficiently and Effectively with Other Scientists of Similar Interests; More than 31,000 Sigma Xi Members are Registered  

RESEARCH TRIANGLE PARK, NC and BERLIN– October 5, 2010 – ResearchGATE, the professional social network for scientists and researchers, announced today that SIGMA XI, The Scientific Research Society, has implemented its social networking platform for its more than 60,000 members – students, researchers, and scientists.  More than 200 Nobel laureates have been members of Sigma Xi, including Albert Einstein, James Watson & Francis Crick, and more.  Since the sub-community has been implemented, more than 31,000 Sigma Xi members have joined. 

 “With ResearchGATE our members of Sigma Xi will now have the ability to share their profiles with other members, see updates from other scientists and researchers in their network with the new microblogging feature, and can share documents and data effortlessly so that scientists can work more effectively together and learn from previous experiments,” said Paul C. Kettler, Founder of the Nordic Chapter of Sigma Xi, and leader of Sigma Xi’s networking implementation project.  “Our 124-year-old Society now looks forward enthusiastically to a long and mutually rewarding association with ResearchGATE in this new and exciting age of scientific discovery."

“Our social networking platform is making information for experiments, data and new developments accessible to all scientists and researchers within the community,” said Ijad Madisch, co-founder and CEO of ResearchGATE.  “Our goal is to bring new discoveries together and available around the globe. Sigma Xi has a vast network of experts who will greatly benefit from this new way of information sharing and we look forward to working with them.”

“To be able to interrelate and connect with others in a similar or diverse areas of science to establish and build on relationships is important, " said Myron Scholes, Nobel laureate and general partner of Platinum Grove Asset Management. “Reducing the cost of communication increases connectivity and enhances the productivity of scientists."

Today, it is with great pride that the ResearchGATE team announces that it has welcomed the 400,000th researcher to its scientific network. The 400,000th User is a researcher from United States of America conducting research in Cell Biology.  As ResearchGATE continues to evolve, we will look forward to innovating science and growing this community together.  The next 6 weeks will be very exciting, because we have several new application in our pipeline. We will keep you updated. Thanks again for your great feedback. 

Boston, January 20, 2010. This week ResearchGATE was named one of the top 100 global tech start-ups for 2009 by Red Herring, the prominent international technology media group. The Global award has become one of the most prestigious awards in the industry, as Red Herring editors have consistently identified promising technology companies. Google, Yahoo, Skype, YouTube and eBay are only a few such examples.

Global winners must demonstrate the ability to handle the challenges of internationalization and a global presence. International collaboration stands at the center of ResearchGATE’s mission. A network for scientists, ResearchGATE has expanded to over 200,000 members from 200 countries in less than two years. The platform was launched in May 2008 and is currently based in Boston, MA and Berlin, Germany.

“The ResearchGATE vision of changing science by facilitating international communication and collaboration has started to become reality the Red Herring Global award attests not only to the platform’s growing prominence but also to its potential within the industry,” says ResearchGATE co-founder and CEO Ijad Madisch, an award-winning virologist. Herring’s editorial staff evaluated the companies on both quantitative and qualitative criteria. “Choosing the best out of the previous three years was by no means a small feat,” said Alex Vieux, publisher and CEO of Red Herring. “After rigorous contemplation and discussion, we narrowed down our list from 1,200 potential companies to 200 finalists.  Trying to get it down to 100 companies was a task upon itself.  The top 100 companies who were chosen should be extremely proud, the competition was difficult.”

"This year was especially difficult", said Alex Vieux, publisher and CEO of Red Herring. "Despite the global economic situation, there were many great companies producing really innovative and amazing products that we had a difficult time narrowing the pool and selecting the finalists. Now we’re faced with the arduous task of selecting the final 100 winners of the award. We know that this year’s crop will grow into some amazing companies that are sure to go". Finalists for the 2009 edition of the Red Herring Global 100 award are selected from the regional recipients or finalists of the Red Herring 100 awards in 2007, 2008, or 2009 ranging from Asia, Europe, and North America. For the past three years, the award has been given to the top100 global technology companies based upon their technological innovation, management strength, market size, investor record, customer acquisition, and financial health. During the several months leading up to the announcement, hundreds of companies in the telecommunications, security, Web 2.0, software, hardware, biotech, and clean tech industries sent in their submissions to qualify for the award.

The CEOs of the 200 finalists are invited to present their winning strategies at the Red Herring Global Conference in Laguna Niguel, California, January 12-14, 2010. The Top 100 winners will be announced at a special awards ceremony at the event. About Red Herring: Red Herring is a global media company uniting the world's best high-technology innovators, venture investors, and business decision-makers in a variety of forums: a leading innovation magazine, an online daily technology news service, technology newsletters, and major events for technology leaders around the globe. Red Herring provides an insider's view of the global innovation ecosystem, featuring unparalleled insights on the emerging technologies driving the economy.

Today, it is with great pride that the ResearchGATE team announces that it has welcomed the 200,000th researcher to its scientific network.  Thanks for your continuous feedback, which helped us build the largest scientific network that exists today. The 200,000 User is a researcher from Australia, who is currently conducting research in Dietetics and Nutrition. As we’re headed into the new year, the fact that so many researchers and scientists have signed up and started collaborating only shows that online collaboration and social media will lead the way in 2010. As ResearchGATE continues to evolve, we will look forward to innovating science and growing this community together.

Two independent research groups from China have recently had success cloning a mammal (mouse) from induced pluripotent Stem cells (iPS cells). These pluripotent cells (originally mouse embryonic fibroblast cells, induced to become stem cells) were implanted with an initial 'tetraploid' embryo at the four-cell stage to trigger development from stem cells into a complete fully grown mouse. While a low efficiency was obtained (1% and 3.5%) both of the groups produced live, fertile offspring genetically identical to the stem cells they originated from.

While cloning is nothing spectacular nowadays, this new method opens the door for simpler, easy methods of cloning mammals - including the potential to be used for cloning humans in countries where such cloning is legal.

The commercial availability of kits to turn cells into iPS cells also allows greater access to the source material needed for this method of cloning.

Original publications:


iPS cells produce viable mice through tetraploid complementation

Xiao-yang Zhao1,2,5, Wei Li1,2,5, Zhuo Lv1,2,5, Lei Liu1, Man Tong1,2, Tang Hai1, Jie Hao1,2, Chang-long Guo1,2, Qing-wen Ma3, Liu Wang1, Fanyi Zeng3,4 & Qi Zhou1

iPS Cells Can Support Full-Term Development of Tetraploid Blastocyst-Complemented Embryos

Lan Kang,Jianle Wang,Yu Zhang,Zhaohui Kou andShaorong Gao

It is now believed that luminal progenitor cells – the ‘daughters’ of breast stem cells – are the likely source of basal-like breast tumors that develop in women carrying mutations in the gene BRCA1. This discovery was made by a team led by Associate Professors Jane Visvader and Geoff Lindeman (couple of other authors' publications: 1,2,3,4; reviews: 1,2)  of the Walter and Eliza Hall Institute’s Victorian Breast Cancer Research Consortium Laboratory, and was published in today’s issue of the journal Nature Medicine. Dr. Visvader indicated that in recent years it has been believed that the breast stem cells are what give rise to BRCA1 tumors. Yet breast tissue from women with BRCA1 mutations has been found to have an unexpectedly high number of luminal progenitor cells, as seen in the research conducted by Dr. Elgene Lim and Dr. François Vaillant at the institute. After the gene expression studies revealed BRCA1 breast tissue and basal breast tumors to be more similar to normal luminal progenitor cells than any other cell type in the breast, focus has shifted away from breast stem cells to errant luminal progenitors.

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