The burden of living up to this challenge rests mainly on the shoulders of the leaders of Europe and the European Commission. A sound design and implementation of the next framework program for research and innovation funding will be key to ascertain that Europe stays a serious competitor in the global research and innovation game. Horizon Europe has been announced last week. The new Framework Programme was framed as the „most ambitious Research and Innovation program yet”. First impressions confirm this statement with strong caveats. Read more [...]
The term ‘value’ is at the centre of an increasingly explicit debate in the fields of health and healthcare policy. ‘Value’ is understood in many different ways and diverging interests are being mobilised. How are values in biomedical innovation being expressed, represented, materialised and aligned or contested in different areas of biomedicine? How do values embedded in regulation, public health, economic policies, healthcare provision, technology assessment, producers' strategies, and patient organisation movements shape biomedical innovations? At an ESOF discussion in Toulouse multidisciplinary perspectives on value between panel members and public participants will be explored and possible pathways to common solutions identified that promote socially acceptable biomedical innovation in the European context. Read more [...]
A data and science journalism investigation on seed control about the interaction between industry and farmers in the global seeds business. Read more [...]
Is it going to be forever difficult for small farmers to enter the market? SEEDcontrol is a project born from the partnership between formicablu, an Italian science communication agency, and Oxpeckers, a South African Center for Investigative Environmental Journalism. Specifically, the project has been designed by Elisabetta Tola and Fiona Macleod. Read more [...]
Innovation hubs have now been mapped out in Europe; And their relative strengths identified. Nesta's 2016 European Digital City Index (EDCi), is a composite indicator which measures the receptiveness of cities across Europe for young digital firms. These indicators include access to funding, business environment and the prevalent entrepreneurial culture in each city. London, Stockholm, Paris, Amsterdam and Helsinki round out the top five spots. Meanwhile, Berlin, Barcelona, Copenhagen, Dublin and Vienna comprising the top ten. Find out more about the role that local conditions can play in encouraging the entrepreneurship and scaling-up of innovative businesses. Read more [...]
In 2008, it was the first time that a software virus replicating the automatic process control system of a nuclear facility was recorded. In this opinion piece, Anastasia Tolstaya, an engineer at the Institute for Cyber-Intelligence Systems, Moscow Engineering Physics Institute, in the Russian Federation, explores what can be done to prevent exposing the safety of nuclear plants, in the case of a cyber attack. Finding solutions, she argues, is not trivial. Read more [...]
The role that scientific advances and technological innovations play on the fate of civilisations is illustrated by numerous examples, including food-related developments (improved species in agriculture and livestock), health (hygiene and the discovery of antibiotics), and lifestyle (popularisation of the internet). However, none of these examples triggers immediate effects on the nation's evolution as those innovations related to military technology. Read more [...]
With Panama papers, we got a clear demonstration how the human societies are spoilt worldwide by the obsession of top-down spheres for compulsive self-enrichement and nepotism. The huge work developed by the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists will Read more [...]
The interface between science and business is where innovation is brought to life, but do the two fields always get along? Some of the speakers and session organisers of the EuroScience Open Forum (ESOF2016) Business Programme, launching on 11th of April 2016 in London, UK, speak about how best to reconcile the two. Read more [...]
Disruptive innovation has to be accompanied by social and cultural progress. In the provocative opinion piece, Kirsten Drotner from the University of Southern Denmark and Mariachiara Esposito from Science Europe call for policy makers in Europe to abandon the prevailing approach to innovation that has informed European policies and funding programmes, in particular Horizon 2020. Instead, they call for a recognition of the role of arts and humanities research in fostering future innovation. Read more [...]
Welcome to this special issue of EuroScientist focusing on Gender issues in research and academia. We have asked the views of Nobel Laureates, who have an interesting perspective on women in science. You will also discover a wealth of opinions describing what remains to be done to resolve gender issues. Not only do we discuss ways of resolving conscious and unconscious gender bias, but we also look at issues related to how gender perspective affects the nature of research itself. As for solutions, it appears that mentoring is one of the most helpful solution, beyond more interventionist approaches such as quota, which are controversial. Read more [...]
European science conversations by the community, for the community
