ResearchGate News

ResearchGate turns Five

nospam@example.com (ResearchGate Digital Team) — Fri, 24 May 2013 10:15:51 +0000

Happy birthday dear ReseachGate, happy birthday to us!

Yesterday marked ResearchGate’s 5th anniversary, which we celebrated in style at our Berlin headquarters with a BBQ.

Thank you for being a part of ResearchGate. Here’s to the past five years, and many more years to come!

Check out our birthday video here:

Chancellor Angela Merkel visits ResearchGate HQ

nospam@example.com (ResearchGate Digital Team) — Fri, 08 Mar 2013 14:45:50 +0000

Yesterday was a big day here at ResearchGate HQ: Chancellor Angela Merkel came to visit us on a tour of the Berlin startup scene!

The former physicist was in high spirits and very interested to learn about how we’re connecting researchers worldwide and leading science into the digital age.

It all started with Ijad Madisch, our CEO and co-founder, who presented the chancellor with a short intro to the company and a few examples of successful collaborations that came about through the platform. For Chancellor Merkel this was “a glimpse into the future, a future that’s already becoming reality.” We took this as a big compliment, and a big stamp of approval.

Mrs. Merkel also got to sit down with a few of ResearchGate’s best: engineers, product managers, and our feelgood manager. She was very impressed: “All of this can only be achieved because everyone has dedicated themselves to a common vision.”

Matt Cohler of Benchmark, one of our investors, said: “It was fascinating to witness world changers from the scientific and political arenas come together. To experience this and to have the opportunity to participate is a privilege for me.”

We’d have loved to have shown her even more, but after 45 minutes she was on the road again, this time to visit our friends at Wooga, the popular social game developer headquartered just around the corner from us in Berlin.

For all of us here at ResearchGate HQ it was a great honor to welcome the chancellor. We couldn’t have done it without you though. Mrs. Merkel knows that and has a message for you:

“Good luck to all the scientists on ResearchGate. May your constant search for answers help to make the network even better.”

Thank you all for helping to make ResearchGate what it is today. Please keep your feedback coming.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel and Federal Minister Philipp Rösler to visit ResearchGate

nospam@example.com (ResearchGate Digital Team) — Fri, 01 Mar 2013 10:30:19 +0000

We’re thrilled to announce that German Chancellor Angela Merkel and Federal Minister of Economics and Technology Philipp Rösler will visit the ResearchGate HQ on March 7th. It’s a great honor to welcome these political figures to our offices in Berlin and we look forward to a rewarding exchange with them.

We’re proud to have this opportunity to present ResearchGate’s role in leading science into the digital age. Ijad says: “The visit of Chancellor Merkel and Minister Rösler shows us that we’re on the right path – as trailblazers both in science and in the German startup scene.”

Our investors Matt Cohler of Benchmark (early employee of Facebook, co-founder of LinkedIn), Luke Nosek of Founders Fund (co-founder of PayPal) and Joachim Schoss (founder Scout24 group) are also excited to greet the chancellor and minister at the event.

We’ll be sure to tell you all about the visit, so stay posted for some photos and a recap of the event!

Foto: REGIERUNGonline/Steins

For more information, please check out our press release.

Introducing Citations on ResearchGate

nospam@example.com (ResearchGate Digital Team) — Thu, 07 Feb 2013 18:08:00 +0000

Add, manage, and curate your citations

We know how important citations are to your research, and how difficult it is to find out exactly where you've been cited. With this in mind, our latest feature lets you show both what you've cited and where you've been cited.

Key features:

Add citations to your publications to show who cited you
Add citations to your publications to show who you cited
Be notified when someone cites you, and when we find more
of your citations in our database

Here's a snapshot of what you can expect:

See where you've been cited. Your citations list shows you who's cited you, and where. Even better, it'll be automatically updated when we find any new or existing citations of your work.

Be notified. We'll notify you of any new citations of your research, keeping you up to date with how other researchers are interacting with your work.

Add and manage your citations. Not only are citations displayed on a publication's page, they're also displayed on your profile, so that you can add, manage, and showcase them to your peers.

Give back. Citations work both ways, so we've made it as easy as possible for you to show who you've cited in your own research too.

Build on your citations

By making citations visible on your profile, we hope to give you more ways to connect with your peers. So whether it's getting in touch with researchers whose work you've cited, or engaging with those who've cited you, we're sure you'll leverage these connections in new and innovative ways.

Add your citations and find out where you've been cited!

Endorse and be endorsed to highlight research skills

nospam@example.com (ResearchGate Digital Team) — Thu, 07 Feb 2013 18:07:00 +0000

Proving that you’re an expert at something can be difficult, just as it’s tricky to find a pro for a specialized task. ResearchGate made both easier with a new feature, Endorsements.

Find specialists and display your scientific expertise

Be endorsed: It’s a simple way to find out who’s the specialist for every job at hand, and to display your scientific expertise. List your research skills on your profile and let your followers and co-authors endorse them.

And endorse: Why not return the favor? Endorsements are a way to show appreciation, so if you can vouch for a researcher’s expertise, give it a click! You know a lot about your research partners. That’s why you can add a skill to their profile if you notice that it’s missing. And if they approve, they will automatically be endorsed by you.

Endorsements will make it easier for you to find and connect to the expert you’re looking for: for collaboration, online peer-review and more.

The next time you are applying for a job or a grant, your profile will be full of references certifying your expertise in anything from antibody testing to zinc extraction.

Go and endorse!

Something unclear? Not working? Just shoot us a mail, we’d appreciate it!

Add attachments to your messages on ResearchGate

nospam@example.com (ResearchGate Digital Team) — Thu, 17 Jan 2013 13:27:23 +0000

Sometimes, something very small can make all the difference. A few figures, a dataset or protocol, attached to a private message, for example, might be all you need to move forward in your research.

And because your research is all we have in mind here at ResearchGate, we’ve developed a new tool to help you out: you can now add attachments to the private messages you send to your peers. No email exchange necessary – everything stays at hand and in one place.

Just drag and drop or select your files from your computer to attach them to your message.

Now let the messaging begin!

Noticed a glitch? Please let us know. As always, we appreciate your feedback and look forward to hearing from you

This year in science on ResearchGate

nospam@example.com (ResearchGate Digital Team) — Fri, 21 Dec 2012 13:50:43 +0000

It’s been an exciting year here at the ResearchGate HQ, and an even more exciting year in science! One important discovery and event followed the next, and all were wildly discussed in the ResearchGate community.

When physicists at CERN announced that they’d finally found the elusive Higgs boson, scientists on ResearchGate were already thinking ahead, asking themselves: “what’s next in particle physics?” While politicians at Rio+20 were drafting “The Future we want”, researchers on the network discussed the hands-on use of technology for effective bio conservation.

Take a look at some of the most interesting discussions on ResearchGate about science stories that made the news in 2012:

1. The discovery of the Higgs boson

We were thrilled and moved at the same time here the ResearchGate HG on July 4th as we watched renowned physicists swipe away a tear or two during the announcement that after a four century long hunt the elusive Higgs particle had finally been found (with a very, very high likelihood). And we were also surprised: most of us were still trying grasp what this mysterious particle was, as the ResearchGate community was already discussing what this finding meant in terms of gravity, how the Standard Model (the theory of how matter and energy work together) may be completed and even what the next realistic major target in particle physics might be

2. Rio+20 and key technologies in bio conservation

As the United Nations conference on Sustainable development, Rio+20, was wrapping up in late June, William Sutherland, Miriam Rothschild Professor of Conservation Biology at Cambridge University, was preparing for a workshop he was about to hold at his university. He posted a question on ResearchGate, asking the scientific community what technologies they wanted to see being used for bio conservation. In the following hours William got more than 30 qualified and precise responses, suggesting for example how low-cost hard- and open source software could be used in the field. William took these answers and used them as the basis for a memo he was drafting, together with 70+ attendees at a workshop in Cambridge. This memo was published on the workshop’s website.

3. The Nobel Prizes

When the leaves turn brown and the last warm days are long gone, the only thing that can consolidate us here at ResearchGate is that Nobel Prize season is about to start! This year the Nobel Prize for Physiology or Medicine was awarded to Sir John B. Gurdon and Shinya Yamanaka "for the discovery that mature cells can be reprogrammed to become pluripotent." That was great fodder for the ResearchGate’s stem cell experts. They asked: “What’s next in Stem Cell biology?” Most agreed that it would have something to do with tissue regeneration and reparation. Congrats were in order for two of our ResearchGate members, Robert J. Lefkowitz and Brian K. Kobilka, who were jointly awarded the Nobel Prize in Chemistry "for studies of G-protein-coupled receptors."

What was your ResearchGate story of 2012? We’d love to hear from you.

We wish you happy holidays and a wonderful new year with many more discoveries and breakthroughs!

Introducing a new way to publish all of your research

nospam@example.com (ResearchGate Digital Team) — Wed, 12 Dec 2012 16:21:00 +0000

Here at ResearchGate, we know your research isn't limited to the articles you've published. Think of all the datasets and negative results that never make the final cut – we don’t think this non-peer-reviewed work should sit and gather dust on your desk.

Our new publishing feature lets you publish anything, whether it’s been through the peer-review process or not. Here’s how it works.

How do I publish?

Think of your profile as your own personal publishing platform. All you have to do is pick what type of research you want to publish, upload the file, and then fill out the details. It couldn't be simpler.

Each file will be given its own page so that other researchers can cite it and provide you with feedback on it.

What can I publish?

This is the best bit: you can publish anything you like. Here’s what other researchers have published so far:

✔ Datasets	✔ Raw data	✔ Negative results
✔ Figures	✔ Media files	✔ Unpublished articles

So, what’s next?

Go to your profile, publish, and start building reputation based on your entire research output.

ResearchGate visits the Mayor of Berlin

nospam@example.com (ResearchGate Digital Team) — Fri, 16 Nov 2012 13:37:16 +0000

This week was full of events for us here at ResearchGate HQ. Today Ijad and Matt Cohler, our awesome investor from Benchmark Capital, met with Klaus Wowereit, the mayor of Berlin. Fun times!

We spoke about why we opened up shop in the German capital and how Berlin can attract even more world-changing entrepreneurs and investors. Mayor Wowereit is enthusiastic about the startup scene and has a lot of ideas to keep it developing.

We’re sure that we made the right decision when we moved to Berlin, and we hope that others will follow suit!

Klaus Wowereit, Ijad Madisch and Matt Cohler. Credit: Laura Trumpp.

The RG Score, updated to consider more of your publication data

nospam@example.com (ResearchGate Digital Team) — Thu, 15 Nov 2012 14:33:55 +0000

Here at ResearchGate HQ, we’ve been hard at work updating the RG Score.

What’s new?

We designed and built the RG Score to adapt to your needs. Our recently updated algorithm now takes a whole lot more data into account when considering the weight of your peer-reviewed publications. We think this update will provide you with an even more comprehensive way to build, measure, and leverage your scientific reputation.

How does it work?

Contributions: First it’s up to you to decide what to contribute to the research community. Whether it’s your questions and answers in Topics, a published paper you add to your profile, or the negative results and raw data you upload, anything you contribute can count towards your RG Score.

Interactions: Then it’s up to the community: not only does our algorithm look at how your peers receive and evaluate your contributions, it also looks at who these peers are. This means that the higher the scores of the researchers who interact with your work, the more your own score will increase. Your peer-reviewed research is then factored in to your score to reflect your current standing within the wider scientific community.

Reputation: With the RG Score, reputation is passed from researcher to researcher, allowing you to build and leverage your reputation based on all of your research, not just the work you’ve published.

And there’s more to come. The RG Score is constantly evolving. Here’s what we’re working on next:

You’ll soon be able to see how and where your publications have been cited.

We’re working on ways to give you more options when it comes to evaluating your peers’ contributions.

We’re adapting the RG Score to include a lot more discipline-specific data.

We’re launching a new way for you to provide us with feedback. Expect to see this soon.

We’d like to thank you for all the feedback you’ve given us so far. Please keep your questions and comments coming.

Go to your RG Score

ResearchGate takes over ScholarZ

nospam@example.com (ResearchGate Digital Team) — Wed, 14 Nov 2012 10:54:19 +0000

We’re in the middle of a wonderfully exciting week here at ResearchGate HQ. Today we happily announced the take-over of ScholarZ, a German professional network and knowledge management platform.

Daniel, CEO of ScholarZ, and Ijad, ourCEO and co-founder, are equally delighted about the news. “The take-over by ResearchGate is a fantastic new start, for us and for our users,” Daniel says. Ijad is thrilled that ScholarZ users are finding a new home on ResearchGate: “Scholarz.net users are a great addition to the ResearchGate community.”

Please welcome all ScholarZ members to ResearchGate along with us! On to even more adventures, innovations and discoveries!

Scholarz.net will discontinue its services in January.

ResearchGate wins a big prize!

nospam@example.com (ResearchGate Digital Team) — Wed, 07 Nov 2012 16:15:59 +0000

Today’s a big day at ResearchGate HQ in Berlin. The Harvard Clubs of Germany awarded us an important German entrepreneurs’ prize: the “Deutscher Unternehmer Preis” 2012 in the category “Startup”.

We’re extremely excited to share this with you, our users, and of course the ResearchGate team. This prize encourages us to go forward and continue changing the world of science.

Thank you for being part of this incredible journey!

Here's Ijad receiving the award in Frankfurt last night.

Topics revamp

nospam@example.com (ResearchGate Digital Team) — Fri, 05 Oct 2012 13:27:05 +0000

When we first built Topics a little over a year ago, we envisaged a place where researchers could connect, collaborate, discuss, and ultimately find solutions together. Topics has come a long way since then, and today we’re proud to announce a couple of updates that we hope will make your Topics experience a whole lot better.

Let us walk you through some of the changes:

Tag it: Rather than asking your question in just one topic, you can now tag your question with multiple topics. This means that your contributions are easier to find, and seen by more people.

More topics, more specialized: More Topics means more things for you to discover and interact with. With your help we’ve increased the number of topics to a whopping 40,000, giving you a wider variety of interesting and targeted content.

Tailored suggestions: To make sure you don’t miss out on anything, you’ll find topic and question suggestions related to your research across the site.

Likes become votes: We’ve removed the ‘like’ button on topic answers and replaced it with the ability to upvote and downvote contributions, giving you and your peers more control over which answers are most visible.

We hope that you like our updates as much as we do. And that topics continue to be a community-driven feature that promises to truly make a difference to the way research is done today.

As always we’re looking forward to your feedback and would love to hear from you.

We’re still working out some little kinks and glitches, so if you notice something that shouldn’t be there please drop us a line.

Go to Topics!

Two Million Members, Two Million Stories

nospam@example.com (ResearchGate Digital Team) — Wed, 19 Sep 2012 14:02:13 +0000

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 (right) and Rick Arneil Aracon at a conference in Hong-Kong, where they presented their findings

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.

Emmanuel Nnadi (middle row, eighth from the right) together with the ResearchGate team in Berlin

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, Chemical Engineer at Cambridge University

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.

Your reputation, your terms: Introducing the RG Score

nospam@example.com (ResearchGate Digital Team) — Thu, 16 Aug 2012 14:16:00 +0000

We’ve been working away at something pretty big here at ResearchGate HQ - and today, we’re excited to officially introduce you to the RG Score, a new metric designed to help you measure, build, understand, and leverage your scientific reputation.

So how does it work? Quite simply:

The RG Score takes all your work and turns it into a source of reputation.

What exactly does this mean?

No matter what you contribute to the network, whether raw data or a publication, topic question or answer, every step of the research process becomes a factor in your score. No work goes to waste; and everything counts.

Once you’ve created content, your score is calculated based on how other researchers interact with your work, how often, and who they are. The higher their score, the more yours will increase.

The score is broken up into several components:

To give you an example: you ask a question in topics or upload raw data to your profile, and one of the people interacting with your work happens to be a researcher with a high RG Score. Their interactions will have a positive effect on your score. And if that same researcher then decides to follow you, your score will increase even more. Think of it as a cycle: the more reputation you gain, the more you influence other researchers’ scores.

But wait... It gets even better.

Our new Dashboard feature gives you an insight into exactly how many people are seeing, interacting with, and taking an interest in your work. You’ll find it at the bottom of your RG Score page.

A new way...

Although the traditional publishing model has brought countless innovations and advancements to light, the speed of discovery is often limited by the speed of publishing. We think it’s high time for a change.

By publishing your results in real-time, you can get immediate feedback from peers, ensure absolute transparency and, through the RG Score, turn all of your work into a source of reputation. After all, isn’t raw, negative, or inconclusive data just as important as what ends up in a journal article?

It’s our mission to give science back to the people who make it happen: you, the researcher. We want to democratize reputation, and most importantly give you the power to build your reputation on your terms, whether you’re at the start of your career or a published author.

Stay tuned: we’ll soon be adding more factors that can contribute to your score, including publication citations. In the meantime, please let us know if you have any comments or questions. We look forward to your feedback.

Go to your RG Score.