Thursday, August 5, 2010

Fixing Peer Review

An editorial in the latest edition of The Scientist discusses five academic papers that ended up being published in less prestigious journals than they should have due to problems in the peer review system. These problems include that the peer review process discourages truly innovative ideas whole publishing status quo or "hot" fields of the day, and that it can take months or years to be able to spot and evaluate the importance of a paper and the impact it may have on its field.

For years, the peer review process has attracted criticism, and this paper aptly highlights five instances when peer review failed. The question is, what are some better alternatives to the process at it currently exists today?

The full article is available off The Scientist Web site. "Breakthroughs from the Second Tier"

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