Researcher (senior)

Claims that academics are indoctrinating their students with liberal propaganda are increasingly common in the right-wing media. John Morgan examines why such a conviction has arisen and whether there is any substance to it

Study estimates that carbon footprint of global student mobility is comparable to annual emissions of Tunisia

The government’s new ‘national interest’ test for research proposals is another damaging symptom of short-termism, says Margaret Sheil

The new Profile and Aitken Alexander Non-Fiction Prize promises a £25,000 advance and a publishing agreement to ‘the best debut trade non‑fiction proposal from an academic’

Simon Baker examines the rise of China as a research nation and the worries this provokes among some Westerners

Academic turned wrestler Dan Mathewson is just one of many educators willing to go the extra mile for scholarship and learning, says Jack Grove 

Matthew Reisz describes talking to Jordanian molecular biologist Rana Dajani about body image, the West’s view of the East and breaking into science’s big league

Seeking special status will further antagonise non-members faced with curtailed access to EU research funding, says Jan Palmowski

As Brexit reaches fever pitch, who knows what damage the 2028 research excellence framework might reveal

Cambridge economist uses nudity to make the case against the UK leaving the European Union and for ‘my body, my choice’

The idea of mistakes being intrinsic to success has become an educational mantra – but for many students and academics, messing up is not an option

The academy is not the military. Addressing fellow scholars by their surnames only is unnatural and disrespectful, says David Benatar 

Academics who want their findings to be used but not abused should bear eight things in mind, says Nick Hillman

Migrants’ stories remind us of the paradox of a comparatively affluent Europe that shows a lack of compassion for outsiders, writes Amina Yaqin

Four lab leaders explain how universities can help academics in the early days of running their first research group

Evidence of strong public demand for access to papers is scant. Might a sophisticated database of lay summaries be more valuable?

Wikipedia should be embraced by universities as an open-access source of information that can be the starting point for deeper research and learning, says John Lubbock 

Portland State University’s investigation of a researcher who published hoax papers misses the point of ethical oversight, says Jeffrey Flier

Book of the week: writers shine a light on the disturbing gap between human rights and realpolitik, finds Matthew Joseph

Some research disciplines have their very own ‘Simon and Garfunkel’. Matthew Reisz talks to some of those whose close and enduring collaborations have convinced them that two voices are better than one

Even in tourism studies, reality often belies the bold, sunny pictures painted in the impact case study brochure, says Rhodri Thomas 

Malaysia and Egypt are making rapid higher education progress, largely because of improvements in citation impact

Universities may feel held to unachievable standards, but removing barriers for all manner of talented people will make institutions better and stronger

‘More objective’ news reporting has not necessarily yielded better politics, finds Suzanne Franks

Ivor Gaber enjoys a biography of an Oxford don who became the UK’s first on-screen pollster

With many doctoral candidates unhappy and reporting mental health problems, Emma Pierson suggests ways supervisors could reduce pressures

Forcing academics on to teaching-only contracts based on flawed assessments of their research is ruining careers, an anonymous academic says 

Turing Institute and British Library collaborate on project to use artificial intelligence techniques to analyse texts

The Canadian government’s excessive policing of privacy makes it intolerably onerous to access its datasets, says Karen Robson

Tokenistic and irrelevant assessments of research’s social value are holding back progress, say Clarence Tam and three others

Academics should not sneer at Simon Birmingham’s appeal to what ‘most Australians’ would think about projects, says Hannah Forsyth

The furore over Brian Wansink’s data handling overlooks the fact that science should above all be about explanation, argues Martin Cohen

Both the rationale and the mechanism for redistributing research activity around the regions are far from clear cut, say Sarah Chaytor and Graeme Reid   

PhDs are becoming more programmatic in many countries, but the German one-on-one model retains considerable influence, says Glen Jones

Take-up of research by business is difficult to catalyse and record. Far better to focus on the impact central to universities’ missions, say Vince Mitchell and William Harvey

Female-only professorships will speed progress to gender equality in the academy, but the pushback shows how far there still is to go, says Clare Kelly

As winter’s tunnel looms, academics would do well not to retreat into lonely silos, says Alison Newby

Jack Grove asks whether those who lead academic departments and universities can still realistically find the time to be effective researchers

Depositories of original sources were once bulging with academics, but few scholars seem to have time to visit them now, says Arnold Harvey

If access to European research funding is to be maintained, more UK research universities need to forge formal links with EU institutions, says Peter Coveney

Dutch figures show just how little time professors get for their own research. It may be easier to pursue your intellectual interests outside the university system, says THE reporter David Matthews

Pioneer of the genetics of hearing talks about how her research interests have been shaped by wine and music – and how she would cope with deafness

If you want your manuscript to be accepted, pepper it with formulaic neologisms, irrelevant but impressive references and suitably indented vulgarity, advises Janelle Ward

If women in particular must watch what they say for fear of a social media mauling, public scholarly fora will be the poorer, warns Charlotte Galpin

Political efforts to silence academic critics are unlikely to end despite clarification that universities are not obliged to ban them, says Pushkar

Matthew Reisz praises the researchers who go way beyond the call of duty in investigating the world for us all

Nick Hillman disputes a narrative that assumes all would be well if ‘experts’ were put in charge

Displays, debates, delights; Allied leaders’ letters; big questions answered; and a groundbreaking trial that never was

Simon Baker weighs the evidence for the transformation of the country’s higher education system

Authoritarian populist governments prevent bloc from taking action to protect academic freedom, say scholars

While widening access is high on universities’ agendas at undergraduate level, class barriers still prevail in the academy. Here, five working-class scholars describe their experiences of ‘otherness’

Tsinghua provost urges researchers to take the risks required to achieve major breakthroughs

King’s College London scholar says that ‘a growing tide’ of academics now recognise that scientific meetings can no longer be held in the US

Members say professional organisations dependent on income from subscription-model journals face ‘existential’ threat from landmark open access policy

Younger academics spending far less time on scholarship than in leading nations, analysis suggests

The withdrawal of funding for Ontario’s basic income pilot highlights the perils of working on politically funded research, says Evelyn Forget

The relaxation of the research excellence framework’s submission rules could see research-intensive universities clustered on near-maximum scores, warms Dominic Dean

Seeking a greater share of imagined profits from commercialisation would undermine technology transfer, says David Secher

Unwieldy bureaucracy, infrastructure challenges and scant funding all hold back innovation in Indian higher education. Philip Altbach and Eldho Mathews assess the country’s current strategies for transforming its universities