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This post was contributed by guest blogger Girija Goyal, cofounder of ReFigure.

Reading and exploration including replications and experiments resulting in “negative data” often dominate the early years of a project. Dissemination of the knowledge gained during this period occurs infrequently and rarely makes it into the small selection of data found in full-length publications. As early career researchers, we wondered how we could make the insights gained during this time more visible and thereby have a positive impact on science.

ReFigure saves time, knowledge and makes your insights discoverable. Watch this quick video to learn how ReFigure works and continue reading for more details.

This guest post was contributed by Angela Kaczmarczyk, co-organizer at BosLab.

Biotechnology is no longer just for those working in academia or industry. At BosLab, we identify ourselves as part of a network of independent Do-it-Yourself (DIY) biology laboratories working towards enabling everyone to participate in the biotech revolution. Our lab exists in what appears to be a funky old garage, but looks can be deceiving. Step into this building and you will find a bike kitchen on the first floor and upstairs you will find our fully-equipped laboratory for citizen scientists. In addition to maintaining a laboratory to support both individual and community science projects, we offer classes, workshops, book clubs, seminars, and social events.

Accelerating science and supporting scientists globally are the shared mission of both Seeding Labs and Addgene. The Addgene-Seeding Labs plasmid grant is a collaborative endeavor providing plasmids to researchers in developing countries. We are proud to introduce the 5 scientists who were awarded the Addgene-Seeding Labs Plasmid grant this year. These scientists work on projects spanning from the identification of plant compounds and insecticidal proteins to the development of renewable biotechnology products and biosensors for herbicides as well as developing yeast as source for dietary supplements!

What are scientists up to on Twitter? Prior to writing this post, my interest in Twitter was fleeting. I’ve had an account for three years and have only tweeted 6 times: #fail. I’d hoped to use Twitter professionally to network, learn more about alternative careers for scientists, and share cool science. Unfortunately, it never clicked for me. Recently my interest was renewed in part due to FOMO  but mostly because of this article: “A systematic identification and analysis of scientists on Twitter.” This paper addresses the following questions about scientists on Twitter: who are they? What do they share? And how they are connected? Here are the highlights written as 8 tweetable facts.

Note: The images used in this post were created using data from or modified from Ke et al. 2017.

Have you ever thought - Is there an easy way to find published plasmids? Do you spend a lot of time in PubMed searching for research articles? Well then, my scientist friend, do I have a handy tool for you.