Signe Mežinska

Why Sorbonne pulled out of university ranking France’s Sorbonne University plans to leave the Times Higher Education (THE) Rankings, adding its name to a growing number of universities rejecting lists that play one institution off against another...

"Sorbonne University plans to leave the Times Higher Education (THE) Rankings [..] most of these rankings are “black boxes” whose methods not only raise ethical questions but also fail to cover the breadth and diversity of university contributions." sciencebusiness.net/news/univers...

Off-label drug use in children and adolescents treated with antidepressants and antipsychotics: results from a prospective multicenter trial - Child and Adolescent Psychiatry and Mental Health Background/Objectives Off-label psychopharmacologic medication use is widespread in child and adolescent psychiatry, but little is known about its associated factors. This study aimed to assess freque...

"About 67% of all antidepressant and antipsychotic treatment episodes in the 700 included patients (mean age = 14.6 years, girls = 67%) were off-label."
link.springer.com/article/10.1...

The Normalization of Book Banning This report offers a window into the complex and extensive climate of censorship between July 1, 2024 through June 30, 2025.

Just a fact: During the 2024-2025 school year, PEN America recorded 6,870 instances of book bans across 23 states and 87 public school districts. pen.org/report/the-n...

GAIDeT: a practical taxonomy for declaring AI use in research and publishing Transparency of AI use in academia matters for authors, editors, reviewers, readers and repository moderators. This blog post introduces GAIDeT, a taxonomy for the structured disclosure of Generative ...

It occurred to me that we need Contributor Statements (like CRediT), except to describe various uses of Gen-AI in research. But like all decent thoughts, someone else had it first. I really like what this group has done. Their tool is useful: www.leidenmadtrics.nl/articles/gai...
#researchintegrity

Krustpunktā Lielā intervija: LU tenūrprofesors Vjačeslavs Kaščejevs - REplay.lv Tematus, ko apspriest politiķi spēj atrast un mainīt zibens ātrumā. Vēl pirms īsa brīža šķēpi tika lauzti par fundamentālajiem pētījumiem zinātnē. Kā šajā situācija jūtas zinātnieki? Krustpunktā sarun...

Noteikti vērts noklausīties, lai labāk saprastu zinātnes būtību replay.lsm.lv/lv/klausies/...

Recent MDPI paper including diagram of a bacterial cell with a mitochondrion 🤦‍♀️ The authors propose a mechanism for the toxicity of silver nanoparticles: "Ag+ ions in AgNPs bombard the bacterial mitochondria’s electron transport chain, resulting in cell death".

Tas ir ļoti bēdīgi, jo tas nozīmē, ka ģimenes arī laicīgi nesaņem atbalstu. Mēs sadarbojamies ar somiem projektā par inovatīvām Alcheimera slimības terapijām, un šī pieredze parāda, cik daudz mums vēl ir ko steidzami darīt šajā jomā Latvijā.

Prekmurska gibanica — Slovenian Kitchen A recipe for Prekmurska gibanica, Prekmurian layered cake.

Ir, ir vairāk kā 10 veidu. Tikko biju Slovēnijā, un tur bija, šķiet, 100 veidu, kā pagatavot desertus ar magoņu sēklām. Zināmākais varētu būt šis: www.slovenian-kitchen.com/blog-1/2022/...

Paldies par piedalīšanos! Katrs respondents ir ļoti gaidīts. Lai novērstu atkārtotu pildīšanu, uzlikām ierobežojumu vienai IP adresei.

Research: low productivity gains from AI may stem from employees using AI to produce "workslop", or low-effort, passable work that creates more work for others (Harvard Business Review)

Main Link | Techmeme Permalink

The threat of analytic flexibility in using large language models to simulate human data: A call to attention Social scientists are now using large language models to create "silicon samples" - synthetic datasets intended to stand in for human respondents, aimed at revolutionising human subjects research. How...

Can large language models stand in for human participants?
Many social scientists seem to think so, and are already using "silicon samples" in research.

One problem: depending on the analytic decisions made, you can basically get these samples to show any effect you want.

THREAD 🧵

Šodien gadījās runāt ar senioriem par pacientu tiesībām veselības aprūpē. Nekādi nepamet sajūta, cik ļoti aplami, ja jāstāsta senioriem par to, kā viņiem labāk aizstāvēt savas tiesības situācijās, kurās visu iesaistīto neapšaubāms pienākums jau sākotnēji būtu nodrošināt šo tiesību īstenošanu.

Exclusive: Journal bans drug safety database papers as they flood the literature celafon/iStockPhoto Starting around 2023, a curious trend took hold in papers on drug safety monitoring. The number of articles published on an individual drug and its link to specific adverse even…

This is another wake-up call about what is happening with scientific literature, which is being flooded by template papers produced by paper mills. One example is the use of open-access databases like FAERS or NHANES, combined with analyses that rely on biased or incorrect methodologies.

Šis ir lielisks risinājums daudzām problēmām Latvijā - prieks iztēloties, cik vienkārši ar šādu programmēšanu varētu risināt dažādus izaicinājumus, piemēram, demogrāfijas jomā.

From the classicalmusic community on Reddit: Arvo Part Turns 90 Explore this post and more from the classicalmusic community

What could be more cheerful than Arvo Pärt dancing on the morning of his 90th birthday? His birthday concert in Riga was also absolutely stunning. www.reddit.com/r/classicalm...

A 20-year-old 'shadow fleet' oil tanker without ice-class is entering icy Arctic route The Mires is 244 meter long and sails under the flag of Sierra Leone. “Ships of this kind are in danger of serious damage if they get in contact with sea ice,” says a professor in ice navigation.

The Russians are showing the same disregard for marine wildlife as they do for human life, by dispatching an increasing number of non-ice class ships to sail on the Northern Sea Route. To prevent an environmental disaster, the Russian shadow fleet must be blocked.

Man jau liekas, ka ķirbju augšanas veicināšana arī nebūtu ok, jo to jau tāpat katrs krietns dāznieks var labāk izveikt.

A hand with a magnifying glass focuses on a chart with a rising trend line and bars. Text reads, "New tool detects problematic trials before they distort evidence." The background features torn grid paper and abstract shapes, with a scientific and investigative theme.

INSPECT-SR has launched today — a new tool for researchers to detect problematic randomized controlled trials.

🔗 Find out more here: www.cochrane.org/about-us/new...

#INSPECTSR #ClinicalTrials #EvidenceBasedMedicine #SystematicReviews #ResearchIntegrity

Certified AI-Free Skills and Knowledge The place to go to know whether they really know

Here we are: "This non-profit grassroots site identifies and verifies courses where ALL student work is done in person, offline, and on paper. " certifiedaifreeskillsandknowledge.org

Paldies, jau atradu, ka ir pieejama bibliotēkā. LU bibliotēka pēdējos gados piedāvā ļoti plašu grāmatu klāstu elektroniski, kas, šķiet, nav pienācīgi novērtēts.

Ja nu kāds ieinteresējās par "Baltic Eugenics", LU bibliotēkā tā elektroniski ir pieejama.

Paldies! Nezināju par šo grāmatu.

Neko nezinām. Tāpat kā visai maz zinām par eigēnikas praksēm (tur vismaz ir prof. Vitas Zelčes rakstītais), vai negribam reflektēt par medicīnas praksēm padomju laikā (psihiatrija, medicīnas eksperimenti utt.).

Sunday mood. Great to be part of a gatherer nation.

🌟 Want to become a #ResearchIntegrity trainer?
The next VIRT2UE Train-the-Trainers course still has a few spots open!

🧭 Learn to guide others in responsible research
📄 Flyer below
🔗 Register here 👉 www.xendens.nl/p/31/dienste...

Tackling paper mills requires us to prevent future contamination and clean up the past – the case of the journal Bioengineered Taylor & Francis journal Bioengineered has been targeted by paper mills. Our goal is to identify problematic articles published in Bioengineered during the period 2010 to 2024. Dimensions was used ...

New paper:

Tackling paper mills requires us to prevent future contamination and clean up the past – the case of the journal Bioengineered

With @deadneanderthals.bsky.social, @smutclyde.bsky.social, @mortenoxe.bsky.social, @thatsregrettab1.bsky.social, and me

www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....

Witkoff delivered Russian medal from Putin to family of American who was killed fighting for Russia in 2024 | CNN Politics US special envoy Steve Witkoff delivered a Russian medal to the grieving family of an American who was killed fighting for Russia in 2024, a senior administration official told CNN.

Can you imagine a US envoy handing a Nazi medal to the family of an American who died fighting for Hitler? Because this just happened:
www.cnn.com/2025/08/20/p...

Researchers suggest one-a-year publication limit - Research Professional News “Probably controversial” proposals intended to spark renewed efforts to tackle “publish or perish...mania”

Not such a bad idea: "Academics should be limited to one publication every year, or even every two years, as a solution to the “publish or perish…mania”, two business researchers have suggested." www.researchprofessionalnews.com/rr-news-worl...

Nice! My preprint with short personal reviews of 31 novels on #ResearchIntegrity now published open access in Chinese.
English preprint: bit.ly/409E5ff
Chinese publication: bit.ly/4osKFYp
@peerreviewcongress.bsky.social @wcrifoundation.bsky.social @nrin-integrity.bsky.social @retractionwatch.com

Sage journal retracts nearly 50 papers for signs of paper mill activity Sage has retracted four dozen papers from one of its journals for suspected paper mill activity. The publisher started an investigation into the European Journal of Inflammation “after we noticed s…

Sage journal retracts nearly 50 papers for signs of paper mill activity