Brandon Stell

Europe's MSCA postdoctoral fellowships are now attracting many researchers who would have gone to the US. So the payline has dropped below 10% (~1,600 fellowships to 17k applicants). Super tough situation. One more reason to double the next Horizon budget, as proposed by the EU Commission.

okay maybe *one* king

Yes, yes, Europe has its benefits. Walkable cities. Cultural heritage. Amazing food. Little gun violence. Healthcare. Governments that are not shut down. But the number of website pop-ups asking one to accept cookies renders the continent pretty much unlivable.

Fraudulent Scientific Papers Are Rapidly Increasing, Study Finds

www.nytimes.com/2025/08/04/s...

“If these trends are not stopped, science is going to be destroyed…”

Uh, really?

I can’t imagine one of these papers ever influencing my lab’s research. Curious if folks studying noncoding RNA see it differently.

Grateful for the invitation from the Royal Society — and heartening to see the growing momentum, evident throughout the meeting, behind separating evaluation from publication.

Academia may be a prestige economy but it wasn’t some choice of scientific leadership- we do it to ourselves, every day. Leadership rarely makes tenure criteria too down - it’s a committee of peers that sets it up for institutions. Leadership doesn’t sit on study sections - it’s peers doing it!

Almost as impressive as the brown trout you can find in the water just outside.

Grateful for the chance to join this webinar series—great questions and engaging discussion.

Brandon Stell puts it powerfully - and accurately: 'We value publications more than what's inside them.'
It's not something we wanted to hear, but it's something we needed to.

White House Health Report Included Fake Citations

White House Health Report Included Fake Citations www.nytimes.com/2025/05/29/w...

Restoring Gold Standard Science By the authority vested in me as President by the Constitution and the laws of the United States of America, including section 7301 of title 5, United

The Trump administration just dropped an executive order, "Restoring Gold Standard Science" and there's lots to unpack. This EO reveals more about how the Administration will approach scientific integrity and science in regulatory contexts. Some initial thoughts. 🧵
www.whitehouse.gov/presidential...

📣 Save the date for the 11th PCI webinar on June 18, 2025, at 4 PM CET!! Brandon Stell (CNRS, Paris) will present "Elevating Scientific Standards: Community-Driven Assessment on PubPeer ". For more details and registration, visit: buff.ly/XuownT0

Learn more about the PubPeer Monthly Prize—made possible by the Einstein Foundation (@einsteinberlin.bsky.social‬)—and explore past winning comments to see what makes a strong entry so that you can win the next one!

pubpeer.com/static/award

Bullet The Reverend Horton Heat · Smoke 'em if You Got 'em · Song · 1991

Hoping to see Horton's heat at Citi field tonight.
open.spotify.com/track/1QlzrF...
@cubsbot.bsky.social

OK we all get that this is literally impossible though, right? Europe and Canada do not have the resources to absorb 75% of US scientists and btw getting jobs in these places was already competitive for the people who live there.

I still think the best solution is to pay good reviewers—randomly. The more of your reviews an editor flags as useful, the higher your chances of getting paid.

Pet peeve: I hate how often ppl claim “all the researchers will just move to Europe/Canada!” You vastly under-estimate how little money there is there vs the USA- and unless that changes ASAP this loss is just going to decimate global science, full stop. 🧪🔭

AI tools are spotting errors in research papers: inside a growing movement Study that hyped the toxicity of black plastic utensils inspires projects that use large language models to check papers.

Is everyone huffing paint?

Crypto guy claims to have built an LLM-based tool to detect errors in research papers; funded using its own cryptocurrency; will let coin holders choose what papers to go after; it's unvetted and a total black box—and Nature reports it as if it's a new protein structure.

How bad this is depends on how far they are willing to go. Are they willing to fabricate evidence to attack vaccines? My guess would be yes.

⏰ Join an engaging colloquium on scientific integrity, featuring the 2024 Einstein Foundation Award Winners next week! @elisabethbik.bsky.social, @brandonstell.bsky.social @pubpeer.com, @helenajambor.bsky.social & Christopher Schmied
at Charité or online: www.einsteinfoundation.de/en/insights/...

Welcome to the Bluesky account for Stand Up for Science 2025!

Keep an eye on this space for updates, event information, and ways to get involved. We can't wait to see everyone #standupforscience2025 on March 7th, both in DC and locations nationwide!

#scienceforall #sciencenotsilence

📆 From detection to prevention: improving the scientific publication record - Join the 2024 Einstein Foundation Award Winners’ Colloquium w/ @elisabethbik.bsky.social, @brandonstell.bsky.social @pubpeer.com, @helenajambor.bsky.social & Christopher Schmied
www.einsteinfoundation.de/en/insights/...

Congratulations to Vitaly Podzorov for winning the January PubPeer Monthly Prize for his outstanding analysis of a 2024 Nature article! pubpeer.com/publications...

These $1,000 awards are given each month. Learn more and see examples of winning comments: pubpeer.com/static/award

NIH memo addresses ‘confusion’ about restrictions imposed by Trump, easing some concerns Memo from acting director to staff allows some purchasing, and suggests travel and study sections could soon resume

NIH staff told they can submit papers to journals but not preprints. "a short pause to allow the new team to set up a process for review and prioritization" <- review by whom...? www.science.org/content/arti... ht @philipncohen.com 1/2

I was led to believe by R.E.M. that I would feel a lot better about this.

Opinion | The Devastating Legacy of Lies in Alzheimer’s Science (Gift Article) Fraud in research needs to end.

Important read on the devastating impact of fraud in Alzheimer's research, highlighting the work of 2024 #EinsteinFoundationAward winners @elisabethbik.bsky.social and @pubpeer.com in cleaning up the scientific record. #ResearchIntegrity www.nytimes.com/2025/01/24/o...

Hope you'll forgive a quick thread as I take over as the new EiC of @elife.bsky.social

But not today. Today they got beat. Everybody should take the W & the lesson that fighting back matters.

American science and medicine has been thrown into chaos and uncertainty over the past week. Here are some stories to get up to speed. 1/12

Only one week left to apply to the Paris School for Neuroscience Techniques!
parisneuro.ovh