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PLOS BLOGS The Official PLOS Blog

Announcing PLoS Blogs

Today we are pleased to announce the launch of PLoS Blogs, a new network for discussing science in public; covering topics in research, culture, and publishing.

PLoS Blogs is different from other blogging networks, because it includes an equal mix of science journalists and scientists. We’re excited to be welcoming our new bloggers, including Pulitzer Prize winner Deborah Blum to the network.

To start things off, we’re delighted that Steve Silberman (a long time writer for Wired, Time, the New Yorker etc) has published a new interview with Oliver Sacks in which for the first time he reveals fascinating details of his personal experience with an ocular melanoma in his right eye and talks about his new book “The Mind’s Eye” which will be published in October and is about vision.

Oliver Sacks, Columbia, 2008

The launch of this network is a natural extension of the support that PLoS has always offered to bloggers in recognition of the excellent work that they do in bridging the gap between scientific and medical articles and mainstream media headlines. For example, we give bloggers access to our Press Releases on exactly the same terms as journalists and we work closely with key figures in the community such as Bora Zivkovic from Blog Around the Clock.

The three existing PLoS blogs: PLoS.org, everyONE and Speaking of Medicine (the PLoS ONE and PLoS Medicine community blogs respectively) can also now be found on this new network. If you are wondering where we got the beautiful image for the PLoS blog header it came from the September 2009 cover of PLoS Biology and is a virtual bead breaking out of its shell – credit is due to: Mark J. Dayel, University of California Berkeley.

Here’s a run down of all the blogs and the excellent people who are working with us:

Our scientists:

Take As Directed:

David Kroll, Ph.D. is a cancer pharmacologist who investigates natural anticancer drugs and is best known under his blog pseudonym, “Abel Pharmboy”. He has appeared regularly on NPR and ABC News Now.

Neuroanthropology:

Daniel Lende, Ph.D. is a medical, psychological, and biological anthropologist.  He worked as an assistant professor in anthropology at the University of Notre Dame and is now associate professor at the University of South Florida. Daniel co-founded Neuroanthropology.net in 2007.

Greg Downey is currently a Senior Lecturer in Anthropology at Macquarie University in Sydney, Australia.  He has published extensively on capoeira (an Afro-Brazilian art form), no-holds-barred fighting, coaching, dance, music etc.

Obesity Panacea:

Peter Janiszewski has a PhD in clinical exercise physiology from Queen’s University in Canada. He’s a science writer/editor, a published obesity researcher, university lecturer, and an advocate of new media.

Travis Saunders is a PhD student in health physiology at the University of Ottawa, who investigates sedentary lifestyles and chronic disease risk in children.

Gobbledygook:

Martin Fenner, M.D. works as a medical doctor and cancer researcher in the Hannover Medical School Cancer Center in Germany.  Since 2007, he has regularly written about how the internet is changing scholarly communication.

GenomeBoy:

Misha Angrist, Ph.D. is Assistant Professor of the Practice at the Duke University Institute for Genome Sciences & Policy. In 2009 he had his full genome sequenced at Duke.

The Language of Bad Physics:

Sarah Kavassalis has a B.S. in physics and mathematics and is currently a graduate student at the University of Toronto. She discusses semi-popular papers that lack an accurate basis in math and physics.

Our science journalists:

Speakeasy Science:

Deborah Blum is a Pulitzer prize-winning science writer and is a Professor of Journalism at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.  Her latest book, The Poisoner’s Handbook, was published in February 2010.

NeuroTribes:

Steve Silberman is a long-time writer whose articles have appeared in Wired, the New Yorker, Salon, Time, and many other national publications all with a Neurological slant.

The Gleaming Retort:

John Rennie is an adjunct professor in graduate Science, Health and Environmental Reporting at New York University.  John was the editor in chief of Scientific American and has appeared on PBS, NPR, ABC etc

Body Politic:

Melinda Wenner Moyer is an award-winning science writer focusing on health and policy, and has a master’s degree in science journalism from New York University. Her work has appeared in Scientific American, Slate, The Oprah Magazine etc.

Wonderland:

Emily Anthes is a freelance science writer and has a master’s degree in science writing from MIT. Her work has appeared in Scientific American Mind, Psychology Today, Popular Mechanics, Discover and elsewhere.

All these excellent bloggers are supported by PLoS Community Manager Brian Mossop. Here’s what he had to say about the launch of this new network (you can read more from him here):

Blogging is generally a force for good because it brings science and medicine to life for a broad audience. PLoS Blogs aims to take scientific and medical communication one step further by doing two things: 1) creating a network that an equal number of science writers/journalists and scientists call home, and 2) building a collaborative environment – both within our blogger network and across the web by featuring content from other blog networks – to make science and medicine more inclusive, and fun

PLoS is built on the principle that the public deserves access to information, which is the heart of the open access movement.  PLoS Blogs will follow suit, not only making its content open access, but by opening up the discussion, and debate, on science and medicine.

We suggest that you review our community guidelines before participating in the debate and we welcome your feedback on all aspects of our new service to bmossop@plos.org.

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