China's main basic research agency is cracking down on scientists who used fake peer reviews to publish papers, demanding that serious offenders return research funding.
► "China's main basic research agency is cracking down on scientists who used fake peer reviews to publish papers in international journals, demanding that many return research funding," Mara Hvistendahl wrote in last week's issue of Science.
It's a small but important silver lining in a year when even NSF's best friends in Congress have turned their backs on the Obama Administration's request for a 13% increase for the basic research agency as part of the political consensus on reducing the federal deficit.
On 24 January, the government announced that it had accepted the resignation of Rolf Tarrach, president of the Higher Research Council (CSIC), Spain's main basic research agency.
The government also plans to shift gradually the evaluation of research in the giant public research institutions, such as the basic research agency CNRS and the biomedical research agency INSERM, away from internal committees and instead rely on external review panels made up of French and foreign scientists.
The basic research agency is slated to get a $3 billion temporary bump up--half its current $6 billion budget--to spend in the next 20 months on research, training, instrumentation, and infrastructure projects.
On 9 October the House Appropriations Committee voted a $614 million increase in the 2003 budget for the National Science Foundation (NSF), a 13% jump nearly in line with the community's hope for a 5-year doubling of the $5 billion basic research agency.
Indeed, other public research organizations were awarded smaller amounts--the basic research agency CNRS, for example, will receive a 9% research boost.
PARIS--France's mammoth basic research agency has come under blistering attack from the nation's government accounting body.
After nearly 6 weeks without a director-general, France's $2.2 billion basic research agency named a new leader today.
